Cheezies are a brand of cheese puff snack food made and sold in Canada by W. T. Hawkins Ltd. The snack is made from extruded cornmeal covered in powdered

cheddar cheese Cheddar cheese (or simply cheddar) is a natural cheese that is relatively hard, off-white (or orange if colourings such as annatto are added), and sometimes sharp-tasting. Cheddar originates from the English village of Cheddar in Somerset. Ched ...

, and sold in distinctive red-and-white bags.

History

The snack was invented after the Second World War by James Marker of Dayton, Ohio and W. T. Hawkins. The pair were living in Chicago when they discovered a method, by trial and error, of extruding cornmeal, casting it into fingerling shapes, then deep frying it in vegetable shortening and sprinkling it with

. Production was moved to Tweed, Ontario in 1949 where the recipe was perfected and the W. T. Hawkins Ltd. plant established."Canada loses Cheezie Whiz", ''

The Calgary Sun The ''Calgary Sun'' is a daily newspaper published in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. It is owned by Postmedia. First published in 1980, the tabloid-format daily replaced the long-running tabloid-size newspaper ''The Albertan'' soon after it was acq ...

'', QMI Agency, Friday, May 4, 2012 Production was moved to a factory in Belleville, Ontario in 1956 after fire destroyed the original plant in Tweed. They concentrated exclusively on Cheezies after dropping other snack foods from their portfolio. The snack has been produced in the same facility ever since and continues to be sold across Canada. Marker's original machine is still used to manufacture Cheezies at the company's plant, as of 2012. Marker remained vice president of the W. T. Hawkins Company until his death in 2012. On September 19 2016, a storage warehouse for W. T. Hawkins in Belleville also was destroyed by fire.

Competition

Old Dutch Foods produced two similar products in the 1970s, cheese-flavoured and barbecue-flavoured "Crunchys". They later were discontinued and Old Dutch continues to produce the Crunchys in two cheese flavours.Old Dutch Foods:Crunchys
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References

{{Reflist

External links

That's Cheezies with a Zed
CBC radio documentary on WT Hawkins
Why Hawkins Cheezies Are Canada's Most Delicious Under-The-Radar Snack
Nostalgic look at Cheezies by Isabel B. Slone Updated May 7, 2021 Canadian snack foods Brand name snack foods