Cheez-it chicken (Courtesy photo)

Obviously, not everything we eat is particularly nutritious or of gourmet quality. Sometimes, when we’re wandering around the house late at night, we just have the munchies and are looking for something to shove into our face. Potato chips fall into this category, as do pretzels, and those ubiquitous little yellow squares known as Cheez-its.

So familiar are these crackers that most of us think of them as always having been there. The truth is, however, that Cheez-its are celebrating their 100th anniversary just this year.

Despite being invented in 1921, Cheez-its have roots much further back in time, specifically in the odd theories about diet and health which appeared in the 19th century. In 1841, Dr. William W. Wolf moved into Dayton, Ohio, to practice homeopathy, a discipline that has at its basis the healing power of food. Along with Sylvester Graham, inventor of the Graham Cracker, he was a fervent temperance advocate, who also believed that the modern diet contained far too many stimulating substances, leading to various evils, including licentiousness. Wolf’s contribution was the Wolf Cracker, a butter-flavored snack which was an immediate hit throughout the state.

Two of the crackers’ favorite fans were a couple of farm boys, J.W. and Weston Green. Out on the plains of North Dakota, they yearned for the flavors of their boyhood in Dayton, specifically Wolf Crackers. They would order huge quantities of the things to get them through the cold, dark winters on the plains.

When Wolf died in 1897, J.W. Green immediately purchased the Wolf Bakery Company, putting his son, Weston, in charge of the business. The new company, Green & Green, continued to produce their landmark treat, now renamed the “Dayton Cracker.” But the company got its first real financial kick with the outbreak of World War I, and the landing of a juicy government contract to feed the troops. All of the facilities were mobilized for the production of “Dayton’s Fighting Bread,” which was basically hardtack, a combination of salt, flour and water that held up well on the lines, provided it was stored properly. These crackers were generally soaked in warm water before consumption, just so troops could get their teeth through them.

When hostilities ended in 1918, Green and Green turned their attention again to the domestic market, and, on May 23, 1921, introduced Cheez-its, also known as “Baked Rarebit,” to the public. Rarebit is a Welsh dish, comprised of cheese, beer, and a little flour, spread on toast and baked in the oven. Cheez-its may not have meant anything, but they certainly knew what this was. At ten cents for a one-pound box, they were a handy way to keep the bellies of the nation full. With the onset of the Depression, many families began stocking up on the snack, and its popularity spread throughout the nation.

Over the intervening years, the company changed hands a number of times. In 1932, the concern was sold to the Loose-Wiles Biscuit Company, out of Kansas City. Fifteen years later, the company was renamed Sunshine, which controlled it until 1996, when it was bought out by Keebler. Then, in 2001, Keebler was, in turn, taken over by Kellogg, which produces it to this day. Of course, it’s come a long way since its humble roots a century ago, and now distributes over 400 million boxes a year.

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CHEEZ-IT CHICKEN

8 chicken tenders

1 cup sour cream

3 cups Cheez-It crackers ; crushed

1/2 cup butter ; melted

•••

Preheat the oven to 375degrees Fahrenheit.

Crush Cheez-Its by placing them in a large ziploc bag and rolling over them with a rolling pin.

Roll the chicken tenders in the sour cream and then in the Cheez-It crumbs.

Place them in a baking dish. Drizzle with the melted butter.

Bake for 40 minutes. Makes four servings.

(Recipe from BigOven.com.)

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