Fortune Cookies

Fortune cookies, thought by many to be Chinese in origin, were born in America. Their soft circles of baked dough are folded in half over a paper message, usually a fortune. American as apple pie, they were popularized in Chinese restaurants after World War II and have made their way around the world.

Chinese often associate a special food with a particular holiday or event. Moon cakes, a food eaten during the fourteenth-century Moon Festival, once carried a message with the intent of overthrowing Mongol invaders. The time and place for a proposed uprising were distributed in many cakes by a Taoist priest and others. However, the fortune cookie is in no way related to this famous uprising nor to any moon cake.