Chow Down Chicago: Good Eats from the Windy City

Twinkies are one of the most popular snack cakes in America. Invented in 1930 in suburban Chicago, the Twinkie has enjoyed worldwide popularity and is still going strong today. The Twinkie was invented by James Dewar, a bakery manager at the Continental Baking Company in River Forest. Dewar wanted to find a use for the machines that made strawberry shortcakes that were dormant when strawberries weren’t in season. He made banana cream-filled cakes because bananas were plentiful year-round. The name Twinkie was inspired by a billboard that Dewar saw for Twinkle Toe Shoes. A pack of two Twinkies cost only a nickel, which helped their popularity since it was the Great Depression. The Twinkie soon took off.   In the 1940s, production using bananas was affected by World War II rationing, so the company instead used vanilla cream for Twinkie filling. It became popular, so they stuck with it. The Continental Baking Company was eventually purchased by Hostess, and production moved to a Sc...