The earliest known recorded usage of the term dates to an 1808 short story describing a spread of "fire-cakes and dough-nuts". Washington Irving's reference to "doughnuts" in 1809 in his "History of New York" is more commonly cited as the first written recording of the term. Irving described "balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog's fat, and called doughnuts, or" olykoeks"." These "nuts" of fried dough might now be called doughnut holes (see holes section). The word "nut" is here used in the earlier sense of "small rounded cake or cookie", also seen in ginger nut. "Doughnut" is the traditional spelling and still dominates even in the United States though "donut" is often used. At present, "doughnut" and the shortened form "donut" are both pervasive in American English.