I was spoofing the usual trope that French fries come from Belgium.
Of course, their likely origin as street food makes it impossible to be sure, but the earliest written cites are from long before Waterloo and put it in France.
Belgian historian of food, Pierre Leqluercq noted that the first recorded mention of French fries is in a Parisian book in 1775. He traced the history of French fries and found the first recipe of what is a modern-day French fry in a French cookbook from 1795, La cuisinière républicaine.
What seems to be etymologically sound is that American troops in Belgium in WWI were introduced to them in the French-speaking sector of Belgium and so called them French fries, whether that was geographically sound or not.
The cake was originally called “German’s Chocolate Cake”. It was named after a brand of chocolate used in the recipe, called “German’s Sweet Chocolate”, itself named after chocolate maker Samuel German (not Germain).
Indeed, from my research the Viennese call them kopenhagener gebäck or “Copenhagen pastries”, whereas the Danes themselves (along with the rest of Scandinavia) call them wienerbrød or “Viennese bread”.
I wrote a whole book on misleading geographical terms like these
Today I learned that Helen Hayes was the first performer to achieve the ‘Triple Crown of Acting’, winning an Oscar in 1931, a Tony in 1947, and an Emmy in 1953.
