There are certain foods that feel undeniably American: a burger sizzling on the grill, a tray of mac and cheese at a family gathering, an apple pie cooling on the windowsill. You grow up seeing them at cookouts, diners, school cafeterias and holiday get-togethers, so you kind of assume they’ve always been here, right?
Spoiler alert: They haven’t! As it turns out, many of these so-called American foods didn’t start out in America. Instead, they born elsewhere—sometimes centuries or even millennia earlier—before crossing oceans, changing with new ingredients and eventually evolving into the dishes we know today. In many cases, what we think of as American food is really the story of immigrants, adaptation and reinvention.
That’s fitting, because America’s food history mirrors America’s history. “We’re a country of immigrants, and the foods are immigrants,” says culinary historian Michael Krondl. “[People] adapt and transform it.”
That theme is echoed by culinary historian Ken Albala, PhD, a history professor at the University of the Pacific. He notes that American cuisine is influenced by “everything and everyone who’s come here. [People] put their own spin on things and change it in a way that makes it very unique and, I would argue, very American.” In other words, “American” food is less about a single origin and more about continual reinvention, as immigrant traditions mix with local ingredients and evolving tastes.
So which of our favorite “American” foods have surprisingly global roots, and how did they evolve into the dishes we know and love? Settle in to learn a few fascinating food facts—and likely get very hungry along the way. Don’t say we didn’t warn you!
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Apple pie
Where it’s actually from: England and the Netherlands
The saying “as American as apple pie” is so familiar that most people never question it. But neither apples nor pies originated in America. “The reason we say it is because it was a British import with our first colonists,” says Kaufman. “Pie was something that had potentially both preservative functions and was a way of using bounty. It was also easy to eat and relatively easy to prepare if you did not have a lot of material in your kitchen.”
Believe it or not, apple pies existed in medieval Europe—the first recorded mention of the dish in the Oxford English Dictionary is 1589! That said, early versions were quite different from today’s sweet, cinnamon-heavy dessert. Sugar was expensive, and recipes generally leaned more savory or lightly spiced. Albala notes that early English versions sometimes included cheese or custard-like fillings. Dutch settlers in the 18th and 19th centuries likely played a major role in shaping the sweeter baked version Americans eventually embraced.
What made apple pie American wasn’t its origin but its adoption. Apples spread across the growing nation, helped in part by the legendary efforts of Johnny Appleseed, and pie became an everyday staple.
Hamburger
Where it’s actually from: Hamburg, Germany
The hamburger, as in the meat patty, traces back to Hamburg, Germany, where minced beef dishes were common in the 1800s. But chopped meat itself goes back much further. “You’ve got ways of stretching meat by putting in fillers, and it can be easier to chew if dental work is not your forte,” says Kaufman. “So chopping meat and making it into something like a patty or a meatball [has been around] for millennia.”
German immigrants brought their dish of seasoned ground beef with them; the Hamburg Steak appeared on the menu of New York City’s Delmonico’s restaurant in 1834. It eventually evolved into the hamburger sandwich, although there are conflicting reports as to who did it first. According to one widely believed tale, Charlie Nagreen, a vendor at an 1885 fair in Seymour, Wisconsin, realized fairgoers were hungry but needed something portable. So he flattened the meatballs he was selling and served them between two slices of bread, and the hamburger as we know it was born.
Albala finds it fascinating that the iconic bun-and-patty sandwich became such a defining national food. “There’s no logical reason why the hamburger should have become the quintessential American food,” he says. Yet through the rise of chains such as McDonald’s and Burger King, it became one of the most recognizable symbols of American cuisine.
Hot dog
Where it’s actually from: Frankfurt, Germany, and Vienna, Austria
The hot dog’s roots lie in sausages such as frankfurters and wieners, both named after the European cities where they originated and brought to America by German-speaking immigrants in the 19th century. By the 1860s, pushcarts in New York City began serving sausages with bread. And in 1871, Charles Feltman, a German baker, opened the first Coney Island hot dog stand, selling 3,684 “dachshund sausages” in a milk roll his first year in business, according to the National Hot Dog and Sausage Council. The world-renowned Nathan’s opened its first hot dog stand in 1916.
Hot dogs quickly became street-food favorites—especially once they started being served in buns at fairs and baseball games. What ultimately made the hot dog feel American? “The fact that you can pick it up with your hand,” says Krondl.
He also points to one particularly American twist in the evolution: Jewish immigrants transformed what were traditionally pork sausages into beef versions to comply with kosher dietary laws.
French fries
Where they’re actually from: Belgium and France
Fries weren’t born here and, despite the name, probably didn’t originate in France either. Belgium is often credited with developing fried potatoes centuries ago, and recipes for deep-fried potato slices appeared in French cookbooks long before fries became American staples.
The Virginia House-wife, a cookbook from 1824 by Mary Randolph (a relation of Thomas Jefferson), has a recipe for fried sliced potatoes, and there’s a recipe for the same dish in Jefferson’s own hand. Throughout the 19th century, potatoes were fried in a variety of shapes and sizes, but by the 1870s, some types of fried potatoes were standardized into particular shapes and sizes. The ones that were round and extremely thin became potato chips. The ones that were long, rectangular and approximately one-fourth of an inch thick became “french fried potatoes,” a name that was shortened to french fries by 1886, per the Oxford English Dictionary.
By the early 20th century, fries were common at diners and lunch counters, but their popularity exploded after World War II. The rise of car culture, drive-ins and fast-food chains (hello, McDonald’s) made fries cheap, convenient and easy to serve alongside hamburgers.
While we’re on the topic, that red stuff we put on our fries? Also not American. Ketchup began as fermented fish sauce in Southeast Asia. British traders adapted it, and over time, Americans transformed it into today’s tomato-based version.
Fried chicken
Where it’s actually from: England, Scotland and West Africa
Modern fried chicken emerged from a cultural exchange. British settlers brought traditions of cooking chicken in fried, battered and fricasseed preparations. Hannah Glasse’s influential cookbook The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy (1747) includes recipes for “Scotch chickens,” a fricassee-like dish, as well as battered and fried chicken dishes.
But it was enslaved West Africans who contributed deep-frying techniques, bold seasoning traditions and culinary expertise that helped transform these earlier European dishes into the crisp, flavorful fried chicken that became a hallmark of Southern cuisine. As Krondl notes, it represents a blending of European and African food that defined much of early American cooking.
Barbecue
Where it actually came from: Indigenous Caribbean nations
The word barbecue itself comes from the word barbacoa, which, in the Arawak and Taíno languages of the Caribbean, originally meant a “framework of sticks set upon posts.” Albala notes that slow-cooking meat over an open fire is hardly unique to America. “Every place in the world has a tradition of low, slow cooking over hot coals,” he says. The Europeans in the New World quickly adopted this novel method of slow cooking. And enslaved Africans (who did most of the cooking) brought their own traditions of seasoning, stewing and whole-animal cooking techniques. As Krondl explains: You’d fill a pit with coals, dump in a pig or cow, and cover it to cook.
Often, barbecues weren’t just the cooking technique; they were also the party. In a 1773 diary entry, George Washington says that he attended a “Barbicue [sic] of my own giving at Accatinck.” We still often call a backyard party a barbecue—even if we’re just grilling hot dogs and hamburgers.
What became uniquely American was the regional diversity that developed over time. Indigenous techniques mixed with European livestock traditions and African culinary influences, produced the distinctive barbecue cultures of Texas, the Carolinas, Memphis and Kansas City by the 20th century.
Mac and cheese
Where it’s actually from: Italy and France
Baked-pasta-and-cheese dishes existed in Europe long before they became American staples. Thomas Jefferson is often credited with popularizing mac and cheese in the U.S. after encountering pasta abroad and serving a baked pasta dish at a state dinner in 1802. The problem with that story is that the “macaroni pie” that was served didn’t really resemble today’s comfort-food classic. “Whatever Jefferson was eating, I don’t think it is what we’re eating today,” Kaufman says.
However, The Virginia House-wife (which, as noted above, had a recipe for those early french fries) includes this recipe for macaroni: “Boil as much macaroni as will fill your dish in milk and water till quite tender. Drain it, salt, put a layer in your dish, then cheese and butter as polenta and bake it in the same manner.”
“That’s sounding more like mac and cheese to me,” says Kaufman. The dish continued to evolve with the advent of processed cheese in the early 20th century, ultimately becoming the ooey-gooey comfort food classic we know today.
New England clam chowder
Where it’s actually from: France and England
New England clam chowder may be a regional American classic, but even its name hints at its foreign roots, says Kaufman. The name comes from the French chaudière, meaning “cauldron,” in which fishermen made their stews. In the 1700s, European settlers brought their fish-stew traditions to the Colonies, where abundant shellfish along the Atlantic coast and local ingredients helped create the creamy chowder associated with New England today.
By the way, the tomato-based Manhattan version, which shows up in the Oxford English Dictionary for the first time in 1887, is most likely descended from seafood stews from southern France, according to Kaufman. Manhattan clam chowder evolved in the same way as its New England cousin did—from the European traditions of fish soups and stews—but the Southern French ones (like bouillabaisse) had tomatoes.
Peanut butter
Where it’s actually from: Ancient South America
Long before peanut butter sandwiches became lunchbox staples, Indigenous peoples in South America were grinding peanuts into paste-like foods. European explorers took peanuts back to Spain, and from there, traders and explorers spread them to Asia and Africa, where they became important staple crops. Peanuts were introduced to North America during the Colonial era through European exchange and the transatlantic slave trade, with enslaved Africans playing a key role in cultivating them in the American South.
But modern peanut butter is a late-19th-century American development. Early versions were created by inventors such as Marcellus Gilmore Edson (who patented a process for grinding roasted peanuts into a paste in 1884) and John Harvey Kellogg (of cereal fame), a physician who developed his own version of peanut butter in the 1890s as a high-protein, easily digestible food for his patients.
Manufacturers began producing peanut butter in the early 1900s, but its real turning point came during World War I (1917–1918), when it was promoted as an inexpensive, high-protein ration for soldiers. Returning servicemen helped normalize peanut butter in everyday American diets. In the 1920s and 1930s, advances in industrial processing—especially oil stabilization and hydrogenation—made smooth, consistent peanut butter possible at scale. With the rise of national brands like Skippy, peanut butter became a uniquely American pantry staple and a mass-produced household food.
Pancakes
Where they’re actually from: Ancient civilizations around the world
Sure, pancakes feel like the quintessential all-American weekend breakfast, but flat griddle cakes appear across ancient cultures worldwide. European versions date back to at least the medieval period, and the word pancake appears in English usage by the 15th century.
Pancakes likely arrived in North America with early English and Dutch settlers, but the version most Americans recognize today developed later. In the 19th century, the widespread adoption of chemical leaveners, like baking powder, along with the use of buttermilk in home cooking, transformed simple griddle cakes into thicker, fluffier pancakes. The pairing with maple syrup—harvested from trees native to North America—helped distinguish American pancakes from their many European counterparts.
Doughnuts
Where they’re actually from: England and the Netherlands
As Krondl, who quite literally wrote the book on doughnuts, puts it: “Doughnuts are the quintessential American sweet, but they’re very much immigrants.” English, Dutch, German and French settlers all had some version of fried dough.
Dutch settlers brought olykoeks (oil cakes) to America, and there are British recipes from the middle of the 18th century for dow nuts (sweet, yeast-raised cakes fried in lard). Over time, American bakers transformed these Old World treats into something distinctly their own. The ring-shaped doughnut (with the hole removed so the dough would cook more evenly) developed around 1850 in New England.
Krondl notes that the cake doughnut, which relies on baking powder or baking soda rather than yeast, is an American invention. It made its big debut in the first edition of Lydia Maria Child’s Frugal Housewife in 1829.
Ice cream
Where it’s actually from: China and Persia (and later refined in Europe)
It may be one of America’s favorite desserts, but ice cream wasn’t invented here. Ice cream’s roots stretch back thousands of years to ancient China and Persia, where early frozen desserts and flavored ices were enjoyed long before the modern era. Over time, freezing techniques and dairy-based recipes were refined across the Middle East and Europe, eventually evolving into the ice cream we recognize today. By the mid–18th century, French cooks had developed rich custard-based ice creams made with egg yolks, a style that remains popular today.
The first known account of ice cream in North America dates back to 1744, when a guest of Maryland governor William Bladen described enjoying it at a dinner party. George Washington reportedly spent lavishly on ice cream, and Thomas Jefferson helped popularize it after returning from France with recipes he later served at the White House. Though we still enjoy custard-based French-style ice cream here, the version we typically eat—Philadelphia-style ice cream, an eggless recipe made with cream, milk and sugar—emerged in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Which foods actually originated here?
Yes, there are some wholly American foods, and they are just as amazing as our favorites above. Here’s what was born right here in the good old US of A.
- Brownies: The rich, fudgy chocolate bar that became a staple of American home baking was developed in the United States in the late 19th to early 20th centuries. However, early versions appeared in New England, and a famously rich variation was created at the Palmer House Hotel in Chicago for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition before this classic treat spread widely through American cookbooks and home kitchens.
- Buffalo wings: The classic game-day food—fried chicken wings tossed in hot sauce and butter and served with blue cheese dressing and celery sticks—was invented at the Anchor Bar in Buffalo, New York, in 1964.
- Chocolate chip cookies: Invented by Ruth Wakefield at the Toll House Inn in Whitman, Massachusetts, in 1938, they were a happy accident when pieces of chocolate held their shape rather than fully melting into the dough. “It was a mistake, and it worked, and people liked it,” says Kaufman.
- Cobb salad: Created at the Brown Derby restaurant in Los Angeles in the late 1930s, the Cobb salad is said to have originated when owner Robert Howard Cobb assembled a late-night meal from leftovers in the kitchen. Combining chicken, bacon, eggs, avocado, tomatoes and blue cheese, it became a favorite among Hollywood celebrities and helped popularize entree salads in American dining.
- Corn dog: The classic American state-fair snack—featuring a hot dog coated in a thick cornmeal batter, skewered on a stick and deep-fried until golden—emerged in the United States in the early to mid-20th century. By the 1940s and 1950s, corn dogs had become fixtures at fairs, carnivals, ballparks and roadside stands. Their portability and convenience align with what Albala sees as a hallmark of American eating habits.
- Key lime pie: The tangy, creamy dessert made with key lime juice, sweetened condensed milk and a graham cracker crust was developed in the Florida Keys in the late 19th century and became established by the early 20th century as a signature regional American pie. According to Krondl, key lime pie exists “because the condensed milk companies wanted to come up with something.”
- Pecan pie: The classic Southern dessert made with native North American pecans baked into a sweet, syrupy custard filling in a flaky pie crust was developed in the Southern United States in the late 19th to early 20th centuries. It gained widespread popularity after corn syrup–based versions appeared in cookbooks and advertisements during the 1920s and 1930s.
- S’mores: First documented in Girl Scout materials in the early 1920s (the earliest-known published recipe dates to 1927), s’mores became a beloved campfire tradition combining graham crackers, chocolate and toasted marshmallows. (Fun fact: The name comes from the notion that they’re so good, you always want “some more.”) Krondl points to s’mores as an example of what scholars call creolization: mixing ingredients and traditions from different sources into something original. He imagines their creation as a moment of campfire inspiration: “Hey, what if we stick these together?” Genius.
In many ways, that spirit of experimentation is the story of American food itself—what Krondl describes as “an American approach to culinary inventiveness that is in many ways unique to the country.”
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Sources:
- Ken Albala, PhD, American food historian, professor of history at University of the Pacific and author of Opulent Nosh: A Cookbook for Audacious Appetites and The World Atlas of Fermented Foods and Drinks; interviewed, June 9, 2026
- Cathy Kaufman, culinary historian, food studies educator at the New School and author of Cooking in Ancient Civilizations; phone interview, June 9, 2026
- Michael Krondl, culinary historian and author of The Donut: History, Recipes and Lore from Boston to Berlin, Sweet Invention: A History of Dessert and The Great Little Pumpkin Cookbook; phone interview, June 10, 2026
- The Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy by Hannah Glasse (1747)
- The New Food Lover’s Companion by Ron Herbst and Sharon Tyler Herbst (2013)
- The Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America by Andrew Smith
- The Virginia House-wife by Mary Randolph (1824)
- What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking by Abby Fisher (1881)
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