Twinkies turn 80: Is the original still edible?

It was 80 years ago, on April 6, 1930, when the first Twinkie went on the market. As now they travelled in pairs; selling two for a nickel.

The then-Continental Baking Co. (now Hostess) was looking for something cheap, a snack that would go over well in an economically depressed time. Now, almost 500 million are sold every year, and that snack cake became part of our folklore.

Never mind the fact they became a legal defense for murder (albeit an unsuccessful one) in Dan White's trial for killing San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk in 1978. And just ignore the hypothesis that Twinkies are locked in a time-warp of freshness, they're the stuff of legend.

Here are some Twinkies facts, from the Orange County Register:

• Twinkie inventor James Dewar named the snack after a billboard he saw advertising Twinkle Toe Shoes, but never got paid royalties for his creation.
• The Twinkie originally had banana filling, but bananas were rationed during WWII, so vanilla was substituted. Customers liked it so much it stayed in there.
• The deep-fried Twinkie was invented at the Texas State Fair. Here’s a recipe.
• In a nod to the supposed indestructibility of the snacks, the T.W.I.N.K.I.E. Project lists several silly experiments that can be performed on them, such as the “gravitational response test” (i.e. dropping one from a 6th-floor window).

So what's the story about the never-aging, bionic Twinkies? Untrue, says Snopes. But one thing that did catch my attention, according to Snopes it takes a Twinkie 45 seconds to explode in a microwave.

Exploding Twinkies? Cool! I tell you, they're the original fun food.

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