Relax, America — Twinkies will never die

  • By J.M. Hirsch Associated Press Food Editor
  • Friday, November 16, 2012 8:23pm
  • Business

Let’s not panic. We all know that Twinkies, Ding Dongs, Wonder bread and the rest of Hostess Brands’ oddly everlasting foods aren’t going away any time soon, even if the food culture that created them is gasping its last.

Yes, Hostess is shutting down. And odds seem to favor the roughly century-old company disappearing from our corporate landscape. But before you rush out to stockpile a strategic Twinkie reserve, consider a few things. Namely, that Twinkies never die. You know full well that the snack cakes down at your corner 7-Eleven are going to outlive us all. Probably even after they’ve been consumed.

And then there’s the acquisition-happy nature of the business world, an environment that increasingly prizes intellectual property above all. It’s hard to imagine the fading away of brands as storied and valuable as Ho Hos and Twinkies.

Even if production really did stop, how long do you think it would take for some enterprising investor intoxicated by a cocktail of nostalgia and irony for the treats Mom used to pack in his G.I. Joe lunch box to find a way to roll out commemorative Twinkies? Special edition holiday Ho Hos? It’s just the nature of our product-centered world. Brands don’t die, even when perhaps they should.

But let’s pretend for a moment they did. What would we lose if Twinkies fell off the culinary cliff?

Certainly few obesity-minded nutritionists would bemoan the loss. With some 500 million Twinkies produced a year, each packing 150 calories… Well, let’s just leave it by saying that shaving 75 trillion calories from the American diet sure could add up to a whole lot of skinny jeans.

Except that Twinkies aren’t merely a snack cake, nor just junk food. They are iconic in ways that transcend how Americans typically fetishize food. But ultimately, they fell victim to the very fervor that created them.

Despite the many urban legends about the indestructability of Twinkies — Did you know they are made with the same chemical used in embalming? Or that they last 5, no 15, no 50 years? — and the many sadly true stories about the atrocious ingredients used to create them today, these treats once upon a time were the real deal.

They started out back in 1930, an era when people actually paid attention to seasonality in foods. James A. Dewar, who worked at Hostess predecessor Continental Baking Company in Schiller, Ill., wanted to find a way to use the bakery’s shortbread pans year round. You see, the shortbread was filled with strawberries, but strawberries were only available for a few weeks a year.

So he used the oblong pans to bake spongecakes, which he then filled with banana cream. Bananas were a more regular crop.

All went swimmingly until World War II hit and rationing meant — say it with me — Yes! We have no bananas. And so was born the vanilla cream Twinkie, which was vastly more popular anyway.

It was around this time that American food culture did an about face. It was an era when the industrialization and processing of cheap food wasn’t just desired, it was glorified. Cans and chemicals could set you free. And they certainly set Twinkies free of the nuisance of a short shelf life. It’s not formaldehyde that keeps these snack cakes feeling fresh, it’s the lack of any dairy products in the so-called “cream.”

“Something about it just absolutely grabbed the popular culture imagination,” says Marion Nestle, a New York University professor of nutrition and food studies — and no fan of junk food. “It’s the prototypical indestructible junk food. It was the sort of height to which American technological ingenuity could go to create a product that was almost entirely artificial, but gave the appearance of eclairs.”

Then something happened. Suddenly, Americans who for decades had been tone deaf to how food was produced suddenly started paying attention, seeking out organic goat cheeses made from the milk of an unoppressed herd raised on a fence-free collective within a 20-mile radius of home. Even Doritos went artisanal, and an awareness of seasons and availability crept back into the culinary consciousness.

So what would we lose if Twinkies really did go away? From a culinary standpoint and from a nutritional standpoint, it’s hard to love the Twinkie (or pretty much any Hostess product). It’s hard not to wonder how the American diet, the American palate, would be different if the parents of the ’50s hadn’t begun a cycle of turning to processed packages as the de facto snack of childhood.

And does nostalgia alone justify the continuation of something so patently bad for us?

Of course nostalgia, even irony, taste awfully good.

And I notice that a growing number of — dare I say it — artisanal bakeries are going retro, creating their own inspired takes on classic processed snack cakes. Treats like the red velvet “twinkies” at New York’s Lulu Cake Boutique. Real ingredients. So perhaps it isn’t time for Twinkies to go away. Or to stay the same. Maybe it’s time for them to go back to their roots. And then, we lose nothing.

Talk to us

> Give us your news tips.

> Send us a letter to the editor.

> More Herald contact information.

More in Business

Black Press Media operates Sound Publishing, the largest community news organization in Washington State with dailies and community news outlets in Alaska.
Black Press Media concludes transition of ownership

Black Press Media, which operates Sound Publishing, completed its sale Monday (March 25), following the formerly announced corporate restructuring.

Maygen Hetherington, executive director of the Historic Downtown Snohomish Association, laughs during an interview in her office on Thursday, Feb. 15, 2024, in Snohomish, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
Maygen Hetherington: tireless advocate for the city of Snohomish

Historic Downtown Snohomish Association receives the Opportunity Lives Here award from Economic Alliance.

FILE - Washington Secretary of State Steve Hobbs poses in front of photos of the 15 people who previously held the office on Nov. 22, 2021, after he was sworn in at the Capitol in Olympia, Wash. Hobbs faces several challengers as he runs for election to the office he was appointed to last fall. (AP Photo/Ted S. Warren, File)
Secretary of State Steve Hobbs: ‘I wanted to serve my country’

Hobbs, a former Lake Stevens senator, is the recipient of the Henry M. Jackson Award from Economic Alliance Snohomish County.

Mark Duffy poses for a photo in his office at the Mountain Pacific Bank headquarters on Wednesday, Feb. 14, 2024 in Everett, Washington. (Annie Barker / The Herald)
Mark Duffy: Building a hometown bank; giving kids an opportunity

Mountain Pacific Bank’s founder is the recipient of the Fluke Award from Economic Alliance Snohomish County.

Barb Tolbert poses for a photo at Silver Scoop Ice Cream on Thursday, Feb. 29, 2024 in Arlington, Washington. (Annie Barker / The Herald)
Barb Tolbert: Former mayor piloted Arlington out of economic brink

Tolbert won the Elson S. Floyd Award, honoring a leader who has “created lasting opportunities” for the underserved.

Photo provided by 
Economic Alliance
Economic Alliance presented one of the Washington Rising Stem Awards to Katie Larios, a senior at Mountlake Terrace High School.
Mountlake Terrace High School senior wins state STEM award

Katie Larios was honored at an Economic Alliance gathering: “A champion for other young women of color in STEM.”

The Westwood Rainier is one of the seven ships in the Westwood line. The ships serve ports in the Pacific Northwest and Northeast Asia. (Photo provided by Swire Shipping)
Westwood Shipping Lines, an Everett mainstay, has new name

The four green-hulled Westwood vessels will keep their names, but the ships will display the Swire Shipping flag.

A Keyport ship docked at Lake Union in Seattle in June 2018. The ship spends most of the year in Alaska harvesting Golden King crab in the Bering Sea. During the summer it ties up for maintenance and repairs at Lake Union. (Keyport LLC)
In crabbers’ turbulent moment, Edmonds seafood processor ‘saved our season’

When a processing plant in Alaska closed, Edmonds-based business Keyport stepped up to solve a “no-win situation.”

Angela Harris, Executive Director of the Port of Edmonds, stands at the port’s marina on Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2024, in Edmonds, Washington. (Ryan Berry / The Herald)
Leadership, love for the Port of Edmonds got exec the job

Shoring up an aging seawall is the first order of business for Angela Harris, the first woman to lead the Edmonds port.

The Cascade Warbirds fly over Naval Station Everett. (Sue Misao / The Herald file)
Bothell High School senior awarded $2,500 to keep on flying

Cascade Warbirds scholarship helps students 16-21 continue flight training and earn a private pilot’s certificate.

Rachel Gardner, the owner of Musicology Co., a new music boutique record store on Thursday, Jan. 18, 2024 in Edmonds, Washington. Musicology Co. will open in February, selling used and new vinyl, CDs and other music-related merchandise. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
New Edmonds record shop intends to be a ‘destination for every musician’

Rachel Gardner opened Musicology Co. this month, filling a record store gap in Edmonds.

MyMyToyStore.com owner Tom Harrison at his brick and mortar storefront on Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2022 in Everett, Washington. (Olivia Vanni / The Herald)
Burst pipe permanently closes downtown Everett toy store

After a pipe flooded the store, MyMyToystore in downtown Everett closed. Owner Tom Harrison is already on to his next venture.

Support local journalism

If you value local news, make a gift now to support the trusted journalism you get in The Daily Herald. Donations processed in this system are not tax deductible.