In 1979, psychiatrist Martin Blinder was hired by Dan White's lawyers to explain to a jury why White had gunned down San Francisco Mayor, George Moscone, and Supervisor Harvey Milk in 1978.
Blinder came up with the ‘Twinkie Defense’, testifying that a junk food diet of Twinkies and Coca-Cola contributed to White's erratic behaviour. Partly because of his testimony, White was convicted of manslaughter instead of murder.
The story of the Twinkie - a cream filled, yellow sponge cake - is one of laughter, tears, urban legends, health issues and even murder; who could have thought a cake could have so much baggage?
The story started in 1930 in Chicago, when Hostess bakery manager James Dewar - a.k.a. "Grandpa Twinkie" - came up with the self proclaimed "best darn tootin' idea".
After realising that several machines used to make cream-filled strawberry shortcake sat idle when strawberries were out of season, Dewar thought it would be a good idea to conceive a snack filled with banana cream instead.
When bananas became rationed during World War II, Hostess switched to vanilla cream.
The new vanilla flavoured Twinkies became so popular that Hostess decided to keep using vanilla instead of banana cream.
Ever since, America has had a love-hate relationship with the Twinkie.
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Twinkie celebrates its 80th birthday this year (and annual sales of over $47 million), so I decided it was time to take a look back at the snack that I have my own childhood memory of: living in Massachusetts when I was 11, I once kept a Twinkie for nearly a year because I was convinced that Twinkies have magical powers and could last for a year without spoiling.
I was wrong; they only last for 25 days.
America's fascination with Twinkies hasn't waned in the last 80 years.
In 1999, the Twinkie met one of the most powerful people in the world, Bill Clinton, when the then President and the White House Millennium Council selected the Twinkie to be preserved in the nation's millennium time capsule, calling it an enduring American icon. I don't think they know it only lasts 25 days.
Even those who hate Twinkies have created a site dedicated to the cake. In 2000, Christopher Scott Gouge and Todd William Stadler decided to start a
website, The T.W.I.N.K.I.E.S. Project and instead of eating them, they put the Twinkies through a series of lab tests to find the insulation, electrical resistance, radioactive, and gravitational properties of a Twinkie.
In 2009, the Twinkie proved that sometimes it is hard to forget about it; a Mountlake Terrace resident, Joe Traxler, finished what was supposed to be a 2 week part time job in 1959 that turned into a 50 year career, and made his last Twinkie. Traxler has made over a billion Twinkies in his career.
That's not all, though - the Twinkie has even made cameo appearances on several Hollywood shows and movies such as Ghostbusters, Lost, The Simpsons, Family Guy, Wall-E and even a movie about zombies, Zombie Land.
And for those who love to cook, there's even a cookbook - creatively titled, The Twinkies Cookbook - dedicated to recipes with Twinkies.