Here are today’s five things to know about fritters:

Although very similar to a doughnut it differs in the fact that it requires some base ingredient beyond the dough it is cooked with.

The first historical record of the fritter dates back to 1665.

Samuel Pepys, an Englishman who served as a Member of Parliament during the English Restoration period, noted in his diary that he would be enjoying some fritters before Lent!

Fritters are extremely popular roadside snacks all over South Asia.

They are commonly referred to as “pakora.”

Today’s Food History

• 1439 In an effort to stop the spread of disease, kissing is banned in England.
• 1827 Josiah Spode II R.I.P. Inventor of Fine Bone China (Spode porcelain). It became the standard English bone china.
• 1867 Reinforced concrete was patented by F. Joseph Monier. He was a Paris gardener, and developed reinforced concrete to use in garden tubs, beams and posts.
• 1951 The controversial novel ‘Catcher in the Rye’ by J.D. Salinger was published.
• 1967 Arlo Guthrie performs a new song, the 20 minute ‘Alice’s Restaurant’, at the Newport Folk Festival.
• 1980 The California Supreme Court rules that Ted Giannoulas can appear in public in his San Diego Chicken suit as long as it does not have the call letters of the radio station (KGB) that first used it as a promotional gambit.
• 1981 Shukuni Sasaki spins 72 plates simultaneously.
• 2004 The City Manager of Key West, Florida fired its Official Chicken Catcher. Armando Parra was hired in January to catch and relocate some of the more than 2,000 ‘wild’ chickens that roam this small island city. They did not feel he would meet his contract quota to relocate 1,000 chickens by September.