The outdoors are great for burgers, softball, and time with the dogs. French fries and potato salad-not so much. Who wants a dish that has to be served immediately or else might spoil in the heat? That is where potato chips come in. Crispy, salty, and ever so flavorful, chips are perfect for everything from a camping trip to a backyard BBQ. Sure, you know about  ridged potato chips, kettle chips, and low-salted chips, but here are a few facts that might surprise you:

• National potato chip day is March 14.
• Potato chips were invented in 1853 at the Saratoga Springs resort: a customer kept sending back his fried potatoes, saying that they were too thick and underseasoned. Eventually, chef George Crum prepared potatoes sliced as thinly as possible, fried extra-long and well-salted. Thus, the potato chip was born! They were known for a while as Saratoga potatoes because of their birthplace.
• Potato chips are America’s number one snack food—we eat over 1 billion pounds of them per year! Annually, that works out to about 6 pounds per person.
• If you eat Pringles or some other baked brand, you aren’t really eating chips. You are actually eating dried mashed potatoes that were remolded into dough and made into potato chips.
• Using potato chips instead of tortilla chips makes a dish called Irish (instead of Mexican) nachos.
• The most popular flavors of potato chips in the United States are sour cream and onion and barbeque.
• To cushion them from breaking, potato chips are sold in bags that are inflated with nitrogen gas. It also extends the shelf life.
• Some popular flavors of potato chips around the world include country ham (France), ketchup (Canada), shrimp (the United Kingdom), Caesar salad (Australia), and mayonnaise (Japan).