Food connects and comforts us, but it also carries the weight of history. Those bunch of bananas? That chocolate bar? They might seem ordinary today, but their pasts are filled with struggles and tragedy. Here are 10 popular foods with shockingly dark backstories.
10. Fanta
Fanta was invented in Nazi Germany during World War II, when the American-based Coca-Cola company couldn’t ship its syrup to its German subsidiary. Max Keith, the head of Coca-Cola GmbH, got creative. Using leftovers from other food industries, like whey and apple cider pressings, he created a new drink to keep the business floating. This led to Fanta becoming the signature drink of the Nazi party.
9. Taco Bell
You wouldn’t believe this: in the 1950s, Taco Bell founder Glen Bell, was a regular at Mitla Cafe, a successful Mexican restaurant in San Bernardino, California. He befriended the owners and learned their recipes for hard-shell tacos. And here’s the twist: instead of partnering with them, Bell took the recipes and opened his own restaurant in 1962. This eventually grew into the Taco Bell we know today.
8. PEZ
This iconic candy dispenser had a different original purpose. In the 1920s, an Austrian confectioner created small peppermint candies called PEZ, short for “Pfefferminze” (German for peppermint). Originally, it was marketed to cigarette-smoking adults to help them kick the habit. It was only when PEZ came to the United States that the company decided to market it as sweet treats for children.
7. 7Up
This popular soda has a medicinal history. In the 1920s, 7Up was first called “Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Soda.” The “lithiated” part referred to the addition of lithium citrate, a drug used to treat depression and other mental health conditions. In the 1940s, the lithium was removed from the formula, and the drink became the simple, non-medicinal 7Up sold in stores today.
6. Graham Crackers
In the 1830s, Presbyterian minister Sylvester Graham believed that all of society’s ills were caused by sexual desire. And to suppress those urges, he preached having a bland, vegetarian diet, leading him to invent the Graham cracker. So yes, the original Graham cracker was just a plain, whole-wheat biscuit designed to be as unexciting as possible.
5. Kellogg’s Cereal
Similar to the inventor of Graham crackers, Dr. John Harvey Kellogg believed that many health problems came from a lack of self-control. At his Battle Creek Sanitarium, he created Corn Flakes as a plain breakfast food for his patients. His brother Will, pushed to add sugar, won the battle, and founded the Kellogg Company we know today.
4. Bananas
Bananas seem like cheerful fruits, but their past is far from sweet. In the early 20th century, the United Fruit Company (now Chiquita Brands International) controlled much of the banana trade in South and Central America. The company became infamous for treating workers unfairly. When thousands of banana workers in Colombia went on a strike, it led to the bloody Banana Massacre that killed an estimated 1,000 people.
3. Pozole
Meanwhile, this traditional Mexican soup has a cannibalistic past. Before the Spanish conquest, pozole was a dish prepared by Aztecs for special occasions. According to historical accounts, the soup was made with hominy corn and the flesh of human sacrificial victims. The Spanish were horrified and replaced the human meat with pork, claiming they had a similar taste.
2. Sugar
That spoonful of sugar in your coffee? It has a dark, painful past. In Europe, the craving for sugar fueled the transatlantic slave trade. It forced millions of Africans to be taken to the Americas, working on sugar plantations under violent conditions. The work was so brutal that the average life expectancy for those workers was only about seven years.
1. Chocolate
The majority of the world’s cocoa is produced in West Africa, where slavery and child labor are rampant. Millions of children have worked in the cocoa industry in Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire, exposed to long hours, pesticides, and dangerous tools. While progress has been made, these issues still exist today and more can be done to protect vulnerable workers.