This food holiday celebrates the airy caramelization of spun sugar wrapped around a paper stick.
Known as candy floss in Britain and fairy floss in Australia, this confection that looks like cotton has a long history dating back to Renaissance Italy.
The modern version emerged with a dentist named Dr. William Morrison who teamed up with candy maker John C. Wharton in 1897 and invented a machine that heated sugar in a spinning bowl with several tiny holes in it. The sugar in the hot, spinning bowl caramelized and made its way through the holes turning the melted sugar into light strands. They called the sugary treat “Fairy Floss” and introduced it at the St. Louis World’s Fair in 1904.
