Chinese Takeout Boxes were Designed as Oyster Pails

Chinese takeout containers are a common sight at restaurants across many global cities. The small, fold-out boxes with a teeny metal handle are practical and distinctive. However, they weren't made to contain your Kung Pow chicken in the first place.

The boxes' design was patented in 1894 by Frederick Weeks Wilcox. These merely represented a folded oyster pail, which was exactly what its name implied—a pail for oysters. The straightforward origami-style folding design allows some steam from hot food to escape. Chopsticks are typically used to eat straight from the container. It was affordable, portable, and leak-proof, which made it the perfect container for oysters and, consequently, the expanding Chinese food sector that was then taking off in America.

Although it occasionally appears in other Western nations including Australia, New Zealand, Germany, Poland, England, and Brazil, it is infrequent in China and other Asian nations with sizable populations of ethnic Chinese.