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Sweet Tooth · Aaron Mahnke's Cabinet of Curiosities

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  Speaker 1: Welcomed. Aaron Manky's Cabinet of Curiosity is a production of
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  Speaker 1: I Heart Radio and Grim and Mild. Our world is
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  Speaker 1: full of the unexplainable, and if history is an open book,
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  Speaker 1: all of these amazing tales are right there on display,
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  Speaker 1: just waiting for us to explore. Welcome to the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Some people can really get into something, especially
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  Speaker 1: at the beginning. Those who are new to fixing up
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  Speaker 1: cars or close up magic or cross fit can be
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  Speaker 1: downright zealous about their latest obsession to anyone and everyone
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  Speaker 1: who would listen to them. People like Simeon style Ets
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  Speaker 1: Born and raised by a poor shepherd family in Turkey
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  Speaker 1: in three d Simeon got way into Christianity when he
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  Speaker 1: was only thirteen years old. The Roman Empire had officially
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  Speaker 1: adopted the religion less than a hundred years before, so
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  Speaker 1: many folks were just discovering it for the first time.
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  Speaker 1: Simeon had been entranced by a sermon on the Beatitudes,
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  Speaker 1: and only a few short years later he left his
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  Speaker 1: family to join a monastery. Now, Simeon didn't do anything halfway.
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  Speaker 1: If he was going to adopt Christianity as his own
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  Speaker 1: personal religion. Then he was going to go all in,
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  Speaker 1: which he did. He took it so seriously and lived
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  Speaker 1: in such an austere and pauper like manner that even
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  Speaker 1: the other monks thought that he had gone overboard. For example,
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  Speaker 1: Simeon once hold up in a small hut, where several
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  Speaker 1: monks eventually discovered him unconscious with palm fronds wrapped around
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  Speaker 1: his midsection as a form of self punishment. They tended
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  Speaker 1: to his wounds, but they didn't believe that he would
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  Speaker 1: fit in with the rest of the community, and so
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  Speaker 1: they asked him to leave the monastery for good. Shunned
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  Speaker 1: by the people who should have accepted him, he traveled
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  Speaker 1: to a small hermitage and gave up eating and drinking
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  Speaker 1: for lynt. When he finally emerged still alive, the people
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  Speaker 1: believed that it was a miracle, and Simeon had gained
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  Speaker 1: a following. He set out on his own, doing the
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  Speaker 1: best he could to tamp down his physical urges and
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  Speaker 1: live the life he believed God wanted him to, and
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  Speaker 1: the more he did so, the more that others wanted
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  Speaker 1: to learn from him. They followed him wherever he went,
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  Speaker 1: asking for advice and help with their problems, but Simeon
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  Speaker 1: needed peace and quiet, so he climbed what is known
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  Speaker 1: today as the Sheik Barakat mountain and found himself a
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  Speaker 1: modest dwelling in a narrow space, just big enough for
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  Speaker 1: one person himself. Sadly, even that wasn't far enough away
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  Speaker 1: for him to go. It didn't take long for his
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  Speaker 1: disciples to track him down and harass him for answers
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  Speaker 1: and prayers. Simeon didn't have any time for the studying
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  Speaker 1: and praying that he needed to do for himself, so
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  Speaker 1: he kept walking until he stumbled across a pillar in
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  Speaker 1: the town of Telenisa in Syria. He climbed up the
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  Speaker 1: pillar and laid down a platform on which he sat
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  Speaker 1: all day and night. Local children often climbed up to
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  Speaker 1: give him bread and goat's milk to keep him fed.
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  Speaker 1: It was also believed that a pulley system was devised
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  Speaker 1: so that he could raise and lower the necessary sustenance himself.
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  Speaker 1: The Christian elders who lived nearby heard about Simeon's life
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  Speaker 1: on the pillar, and they didn't get it. They wanted
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  Speaker 1: to make sure that his particular brand of asceticism was
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  Speaker 1: being practiced for the right reasons, so they met him
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  Speaker 1: and ordered him to come down. If he refused, then
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  Speaker 1: they would go up there and get him by force.
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  Speaker 1: But if he relented and came down voluntarily, then he
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  Speaker 1: could stay. He agreed to humbly vacate the pillar, and
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  Speaker 1: the elders were satisfied, so they let him remain where
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  Speaker 1: he was. But he didn't stay up there for long.
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  Speaker 1: He wasn't just a hermit. He was more like a
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  Speaker 1: hermit crab, constantly looking for larger pillars to accommodate his needs.
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  Speaker 1: His first pillar measured about ten ft tall by the
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  Speaker 1: time he was done, though his final pillar reached a
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  Speaker 1: soaring height of fifty feet. He called those pillars home
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  Speaker 1: for the next thirty seven years. They were where he prayed, fasted,
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  Speaker 1: and eventually died. His body was found by one of
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  Speaker 1: his disciples, hunched in prayer, and soon taken down to
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  Speaker 1: be buried just a short distance from the pillar. So
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  Speaker 1: there you have it. St. Simeon Stylides may not have
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  Speaker 1: been understood by Christian leaders and elders, but those who
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  Speaker 1: followed his teachings certainly believed in his methods. After his death,
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  Speaker 1: other ascetics started living their lives high above the earth
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  Speaker 1: on similar structures. Perhaps they believed they could get closer
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  Speaker 1: to God that way, or maybe, like Simeon, they just
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  Speaker 1: needed a break from all the noise down below. Everyone
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  Speaker 1: has a comfort food, something they indulge in when the
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  Speaker 1: world has gotten them down or the work they has
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  Speaker 1: been too long. It might be a banquet of tomato
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  Speaker 1: soup and grilled cheese sandwiches on a chilly fall day,
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  Speaker 1: or a slice of chocolate cake as a midnight snack.
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  Speaker 1: But unlike most of us, one woman had a comfort
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  Speaker 1: food that she invented for herself, and that creation changed
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  Speaker 1: the world. Ruth was born in East Walpole, Massachusetts, in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen o three. After attending a local household art school,
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  Speaker 1: she became a high school home economics teacher, where she
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  Speaker 1: taught students, mostly women, how to cook and so. In addition,
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  Speaker 1: Ruth worked in a hospital as a dietitian, and even
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  Speaker 1: as a service director for a local utility company. She
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  Speaker 1: kept busy, eventually marrying her husband, Kenneth in n and
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  Speaker 1: having two children, a boy and a girl. However, in
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  Speaker 1: nineteen thirty, Ruth and Kenneth jumped headfirst into a brand
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  Speaker 1: new endeavor. Perhaps she wanted to be more than a
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  Speaker 1: homech teacher or a hospital dietitian, or maybe she just
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  Speaker 1: wanted the joy of working for herself. Whatever the reason,
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  Speaker 1: the couple purchased a Cape Cod style tourist lodge in Whitman, Massachusetts,
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  Speaker 1: about forty minutes from where she was born. It had
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  Speaker 1: originally been built in eighteen seventeen as someone's personal home,
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  Speaker 1: but because of its location between Boston and New Bedford,
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  Speaker 1: it took on other rolls. After a while, it became
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  Speaker 1: a kind of rest stop where travelers would pay their tolls,
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  Speaker 1: feed their horses, and even have a bite for themselves
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  Speaker 1: before heading back out on the road. But Ruth and
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  Speaker 1: Kenneth had other ideas for their new business. It would
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  Speaker 1: be a restaurant with Ruth as its head chef. She
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  Speaker 1: took care of all the recipes to both the main
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  Speaker 1: courses and the desserts, which wasn't a problem when the
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  Speaker 1: place first opened they only had seven tables, but soon
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  Speaker 1: word got out about some of her signature dishes. There
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  Speaker 1: was her sea foam salad ring made with lime green gelatine,
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  Speaker 1: and her delicious lobster entrees, but it was her desserts
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  Speaker 1: that really kept people coming back. She made killer pies,
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  Speaker 1: the Boston cream and lemon meringue. There was also Indian putting,
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  Speaker 1: a custard dish that dated back to New England's colonial days,
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  Speaker 1: when the indigenous people's first introduced colonist to corn. She
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  Speaker 1: eventually published a cookbook titled Ruth's Tried and True Recipes,
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  Speaker 1: and also started feeding her new v I P customers,
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  Speaker 1: including US Ambassador Joe Kennedy, Sr. The father of future
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  Speaker 1: American President John F. Kennedy. But aside from the pies
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  Speaker 1: and the puddings, there was one dessert that Ruth truly treasured,
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  Speaker 1: her cookies. You see, she was always trying to expand
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  Speaker 1: upon her existing confectionery offerings. The restaurant already sold a
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  Speaker 1: thin butter Scotch cookie, which was served with ice cream.
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  Speaker 1: It was a fan favorite, but Ruth was unsatisfied. She
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  Speaker 1: wanted to give the people something more, so around ninety eight,
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  Speaker 1: she and her assistant Sue started testing a new kind
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  Speaker 1: of cookie made with pecan drop cookie dough. The recipe
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  Speaker 1: was fairly basic, and Ruth wondered if she could bake
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  Speaker 1: different types of cookies using the same dough. She looked
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  Speaker 1: in her pantry for some baker's chocolate to drop into
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  Speaker 1: the mix and came up empty. Then she remembered she
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  Speaker 1: had been given some semi sweet chocolate bars by Andrew
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  Speaker 1: Nestley of the Nestle Company. She chopped up one of
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  Speaker 1: the bars into tiny pieces and tossed it all into
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  Speaker 1: the dough, expecting the pieces to melt as it baked. Instead,
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  Speaker 1: the chocolate held its form. Ruth and Sue had just
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  Speaker 1: invented the chocolate chip cookie and it was an instant hit,
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  Speaker 1: which meant Ruth was going to need a lot of chocolate,
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  Speaker 1: so she reached out to NESTLEYE and worked out a
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  Speaker 1: special deal. They were allowed to print her cookie recipe
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  Speaker 1: on the packaging of the chocolate bars, and in return,
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  Speaker 1: she got free chocolate for life. Nestley even started making
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  Speaker 1: special chocolate chips just for baking cookies, and the company
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  Speaker 1: still prints Ruth's recipe on packages of their chips to
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  Speaker 1: this day, and it still bears the name of the
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  Speaker 1: restaurant that Ruth first sold her cookies at, the Toll
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  Speaker 1: House in in Whitman's, Massachusetts. Countless others have tried to
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  Speaker 1: improve upon that recipe over the years, adding in all
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  Speaker 1: sorts of other ingredients like toffee, caramel, and marshmallows, but
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  Speaker 1: none have ever come close to the ouey, gooey chocolate
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  Speaker 1: e goodness of Ruth Wakefield's original toll House chocolate chip cookie.
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  Speaker 1: I hope you've enjoyed today's guided tour of the Cabinet
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  Speaker 1: of Curiosities. Subscribe for free on Apple Podcasts, or learn
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  Speaker 1: more about the show by visiting Curiosities podcast dot com.
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  Speaker 1: The show was created by me Aaron Manky in partnership
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  Speaker 1: with how Stuff Works. I make another award winning show
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  Speaker 1: called Lore, which is a podcast, book series, and television show,
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  Speaker 1: and you can learn all about it over at the
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  Speaker 1: World of Lore dot com. And until next time, stay curious,
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  Speaker 1: Ye