Confucius Fortune Cookie say:

"You will find the source of your fortune... in bed Japan."

Yes, it turns out that Chinese Fortune cookies originated from slightly further to the east than previously thought - researcher Yasuko Nakamachi has uncovered the genesis of the fortune cookie in C.19th Japan.

"Her prime pieces of evidence are the centuries-old small family bakeries making obscure fortune cookie-shaped crackers by hand near a temple outside Kyoto. She has also turned up many references to the cookies in Japanese literature and history, including an 1878 etching of a man making them in a bakery - decades before the first reports of American fortune cookies."

Full article by Jennifer Lee, available from the New York Times online here.