The origin of a frozen American delicacy

By Tom Harte

You may have never heard of Nephi Grigg, but if you've ever eaten a meal at a grade-school cafeteria, you've probably been served his signature culinary invention.

Grigg and his brother Golden made it through the Great Depression growing potatoes and corn in their native Idaho. In 1951, they became convinced the wave of the future was frozen food.

When a flash-freezing plant in eastern Oregon was about to be put on the auction block, they made their bid. Mortgaging their homes (later in their careers they'd even use raw potatoes as loan collateral) they financed $500,000 to acquire the plant and started a business shipping frozen corn to western states under the name Ore-Ida, a reference to their plant's location near the Oregon and Idaho border.

The following year Ore-Ida began manufacturing frozen french fries, delving into the potato business as a way of expanding its processing season. Today it is the leading brand of frozen potato products in America.

A finished tater tot waffle, cooked until crisp and browned, awaits removal from the waffle iron for serving.TOM HARTE

But wait, there's more. Ore-Ida's dominance of the potato field, so to speak, is not due to french fry production but instead to a byproduct of it, for when french fries are cut from whole potatoes there are scraps left behind. The Griggs were disconcerted that they could do little else with those shavings than sell them for a pittance as livestock feed.

So Nephi came up with another idea. He had the potato leavings ground, mixed with spices, formed by wooden molds into barrel-shaped nuggets and fried. Then he took 15 pounds of samples of the new product to the National Potato Convention (yes, there's one every year) at the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami where he bribed a chef to serve them as an appetizer to conference-goers. They were a sensation. And they have been ever since, a staple of school cafeteria menus and grocery store frozen-food cases to the tune of billions consumed annually. Named by a housewife who entered a contest to select their moniker, they are, of course tater tots, a term now used by people to refer generically to any potato puff regardless of brand, what Ore-Ida calls "imi-taters."

The Grigg brothers, like the inventor of Velcro, the creator of the underwire bra, or the first prisoner to tie bedsheets together to make a ladder, were hardly the first to discover necessity is the mother of invention, but they are the only ones I know who managed to turn cattle feed into a popular American snack.

Now, to be honest, I've never been a fan of tater tots, though I'm mindful of the perspective of celebrated food writer J. Kenji Lopez-Alt who observes, "Tater Tots are better than all but the very best french fries, and how often do you get the very best fries?"

Moreover, I am aware that tots are showing up on the menus of upscale restaurants as Peking Duck Tots, Foie Gras Tater Tot Ravioli or bacon-wrapped Tot Rumaki.

A tater tot waffle, a close cousin of the French potato galette, topped with smoked salmon, creme fra'che, and caviar.TOM HARTE

Still, I remained unconvinced that tater tots are little more than junk food -- until I ran across a recipe for Tater Tot Waffles. No ordinary waffles, they're like the French potato galettes Julia Child once taught us how to make -- only using tots you need peel nary a potato. When it comes to spuds, these are my new Yukon Gold standard.

Tater Tot Galette

This recipe, adapted from one by San Francisco chef Jen Pelka in Food & Wine magazine, is a long way from the tater tots we used to get in the grade-school cafeteria.

• 8 cups thawed tater tots
• Flaky sea salt
• 1 1/2 tablespoons crème fraiche
• 3 thin slices smoked salmon
• Dill sprigs
• Heaping tablespoon caviar
• Fresh lemon juice

Heat an 8-inch round waffle iron. Grease iron with nonstick spray and evenly spread two cups tater tots over it. Sprinkle with salt. Close and cook on medium high for five minutes or until nearly crisp. Open waffle iron and fill in any holes with more tater tots. Close and cook another 2 to 3 minutes or until crispy. Remove waffle from iron and top with crème fraiche, salmon, dill sprigs, caviar and a squeeze of lemon juice. Serve immediately.