Chow Down Chicago: Good Eats from the Windy City

What's sweet, salty, globally popular, extremely profitable, and originally from Chicago? Snickers, the confection consisting of a winning combination of peanuts, nougat, caramel, and milk chocolate, is the world's top-selling candy bar, with annual sales near $457 million in the U.S. and estimated at $3 billion worldwide. Snickers also has Chicago roots. Flash back to the 1920s. Mars, Incorporated, had already launched the successful Milky Way bar, and the company had just relocated from Minneapolis to a new factory at 2019 N. Oak Park Avenue in Chicago. At this time, Chicago was known as the " candy capital of the world " because of its large number of candy manufacturers. Mars company founder Frank Mars wanted to build "the most beautiful candy factory in America," and the picturesque Spanish Revival-style main factory building that resulted lived up to the hype. It took the company three years to develop the Snickers bar, which was named after the Mars f...