The sweet aroma of chocolate chips melting in golden cookie dough fills kitchens worldwide today. This simple pleasure traces back to a quaint roadside inn where one woman's culinary creativity sparked a revolution. Her name was Ruth Wakefield, and boy, did she change dessert forever.

A Historic Massachusetts Landmark

In the quaint town of Whitman, Massachusetts, a culinary revolution began in an unassuming colonial-style building. The Toll House Inn, established in 1930 by Kenneth and Ruth Wakefield, was destined to become the birthplace of America's most beloved cookie.

The building itself had a rich history, having been constructed in 1817 and standing on what was once a toll road between Boston and New Bedford. Travelers would stop to pay tolls, change horses, and enjoy home-cooked meals.

When the Wakefields purchased the property, they turned it into a cozy inn where Ruth's exceptional cooking quickly gained fame. What started as a small operation with just seven tables soon expanded to over sixty, attracting notable patrons including Eleanor Roosevelt and Joe DiMaggio.

Ruth's reputation as a skilled baker and chef grew throughout the region, with guests making special trips just to experience her lobster meals and delicious desserts.

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Ruth Wakefield: The Deliberate Inventor

Contrary to popular myth, the chocolate chip cookie wasn't born from a happy accident. Wakefield, a 1924 graduate of the Framingham State School of Household Arts, was no amateur baker running out of ingredients. With her background as a dietitian, food lecturer, and home economics teacher, she approached cooking with precision and creativity.

In 1938, the woman was looking to innovate beyond the popular butterscotch nut cookies served with ice cream at the inn. As she later stated, "Everybody seemed to love it, but I was trying to give them something different." This deliberate experimentation led her to chop a Nestlé semi-sweet chocolate bar into pea-sized chunks and add them to her cookie dough.

Rather than melting completely as she might have expected, the chocolate pieces held their shape, creating pockets of melted chocolate within the crispy cookie. She named her creation "Toll House Chocolate Crunch Cookies," and a legend was born.

Local Favorite To Global Phenomenon

The cookies were an immediate hit with Toll House Inn guests, but their journey had just begun. Word spread quickly, and the recipe was published in Boston newspapers and featured on Betty Crocker's popular radio program. In 1939, Ruth reached an agreement with Nestlé, allowing them to print her recipe on their chocolate packaging.

Soon after, Nestlé began producing pre-scored chocolate bars and eventually the chocolate "morsels" we know today. The cookie's popularity exploded during WWII when Massachusetts soldiers shared their care packages containing Toll House cookies with comrades from across the country.

Soon, Ruth was receiving letters from around the world requesting her recipe. By 1940, her cookbook, Toll House Tried and True Recipes, had become a bestseller, eventually going through 39 printings.

Nestle Tollhouse Chocolate Chips Commercial - 1989 by The Tape Keeper