Who Was the Real Chef Boyardee?

popular packaged foods often feature a mascot designed to be the face of the product tony the tiger the pillsbury doughboy morris the cat and many others have used their smiling faces to sell cereal baking ingredients and pet food so it may surprise you to know that among the many familiar faces in the grocery store aisles the grinning mustachio gent on chef boyardee products was not only a real person but a genuine chef of some renown hello may i come in today on weird history food we're exploring the life of hector boyardee the real chef boyardee but before we get started be sure to subscribe to the weird history food channel after that leave a comment and let us know what other classic food mascots you would like to hear about now settle in with a steaming microwaved bowl of beefaroni and savor this true story of america's favorite chef chef hector boyardee was born in 1897 in piacenza italy not surprisingly with a very italian name ettore boyardi he obviously had cooking in his blood according to family lore little hector used a wire whisk as a rattle and while this hasn't been confirmed we assume he did the chef's kiss hand gesture to a justice pacifier at the tender age of 11 he apprenticed in a local restaurant la croco bianca long before anyone was paying much attention to child labor laws an apprenticeship for an 11 year old sounds impressive but mostly he spent his time peeling potatoes and taking out the garbage even as a teenager however hector had his sights set on america after kitchen stints in paris and london where he actually was an apprentice he sat across the pond to ellis island at age 17. his brother paolo had moved to new york years before and found work waiting tables at the persian room at the plaza hotel going by the anglicized version of his name eventually paul worked his way up to the position of mater d and was able to get hector a job in the kitchen at the plaza hotel the cooking skills hector had shown as a boy began to blossom patrons were captivated by the dishes coming out of the kitchen many of them recipes he brought from his hometown soon he was promoted to head chef not one to sit on his laurels hector once summer got work at the greenbrier hotel in white sulphur west virginia there at the age of 18 he oversaw catering for the wedding reception for none other than president woodrow wilson wilson and first lady edith balingalt were so taken with hector's cooking and organization that they later enlisted him to oversee a homecoming meal for 2 000 veterans returning from world war one that's a whole lot of canned pasta shortly thereafter boyardee was hired to run the kitchen at barbetta on 46th street in new york which remains in business today chef then got an offer he couldn't refuse to be the head chef at the swanky winton hotel in picturesque cleveland ohio hector then packed up and moved west at the wynton he met a young pantry girl named helen roblevsky the two hit it off and were married in 1923. as a head chef he specialized in surprise italian fare his dishes gained a local following especially spaghetti dinners chef boyardee worked at the hotel until 1924 when at his wife's urging he left to open his own restaurant il giardino d'italia the garden of italy the restaurant was a hit chef hector's pasta dishes quickly gained a reputation and demand for his food grew like blooms in a giardino italian food may have been familiar to americans on either coast but in middle america in the 1920s it was a revelation chef boyardee headlines around the block [Music] patrons loved the chef's dishes so much that they began requesting recipes and products to take home the resourceful chef complied he cleaned empty glass milk bottles and filled them with his famous spaghetti sauce adding some dry noodles and parmesan cheese for good measure everyone was going bon appetito for boyardee customers couldn't get enough they brought the bottles back for refills eventually hector began charging for the meal kits in a way he'd accidentally invented hellofresh but he would wind up developing it in a slightly different direction chef realized he had a saucy hit on his hands he also realized that his current means of production his wife helen stirring and sweating into vats of sauce and bottling it in the loft apartment where they lived above the restaurant eventually would not meet demand with the encouragement of some of his restaurant regulars including a couple who owned a local grocery chain hector took over a food processing plant and began producing and canning the sauce on a larger scale he persuaded his brother mario who was in new york working with paul at the plaza to come to cleveland it's a story about italian brothers there was bound to be a mario eventually the three brothers in helen formed a partnership and in 1928 the chef boyardee food company was born the brothers business began with three sauces the popular tomato sauce a mushroom sauce and a spicy naples style tomato sauce the slogan three delightful flavors for a varied menu when it became clear that sales staff and customers were having difficulty pronouncing the name of the company the brothers displayed their collective marketing genius and changed the brand to chef boyardee a phonetic spelling of their family name hector's great niece anna boyardee would later quote her great uncle as saying everyone is proud of his own family name but sacrifices are necessary for progress eventually the bran lost the hyphens it became known simply as chef boyardee and there a legend was born [Music] by 1936 the company much like lebron james in 2010 and 2018 had outgrown its cleveland facility hector was dedicated to turning out a quality product so he decided to get closer to the land farmland that is the boyardees moved their operation to milton pennsylvania an area that was hard hit by the depression and enlisted local farmers to grow tomatoes hector commandeered an abandoned hosiery mill to open his facility which wasn't just for mixing and bottling sauce either eventually the boyardees even grew their own mushrooms there the company continued to expand its line of products and soon was selling full prepackaged italian dinners a meals worth of dry spaghetti a can of delicious sauce and a canister of grated parmesan cheese all wrapped in cellophane just like mom used to pre-make in new york paul had been talking up the family operation to an executive of a p supermarkets which was the largest food retailer in the us at the time he persuaded the man to give chef boyardee products a shot on a p shelves before long practically every store was carrying the chef boyardee lines soon the company was processing 20 000 tons of tomatoes a season additionally chef boyardee became the largest mushroom producer in the nation and the largest importer of olive oil and parmesan cheese chef boyardee was the top-selling italian food product in the u.s and over time expanded its product line to include ravioli pizza kits and eventually beefaroni mitch for those who are never children is macaroni in a beef sauce the business was booming as anna boyardee wrote in her book delicious memories recipes and stories from the chef boyardee family it is fair to say that those three men with no formal education and very little money can be credited with bringing italian food to america when world war ii erupted in europe chef hector and the company sought ways to aid in the effort u.s troops fighting overseas missed the comforts of home so the factory began making army rations plus cans of chef boyardee could make formidable projectiles in a battlefield setting beginning in 1942 the milton plant was operating 24 7 to satisfy demand and when they weren't busy with production boyard employees would march through milton in a display of patriotism beneath banners that read keep them flying keep them rolling keep them well fed by the time the war ended 5 000 people worked at the company without put far exceeding that of the 1930s in 1946 employees gathered for a celebration in milton to commemorate the company's war effort hector boyard was awarded the gold star one of the highest honors a civilian can receive despite their wild success boyardee and his brothers came to a difficult realization to sustain the increased production demands and preserve all those jobs they would have to sell in 1946 chef boyardee was acquired by american home products for nearly 6 million dollars the u.s corporation at the time held a variety of food and household products under its umbrella including pam cooking spray bumble bee tuna easy off oven cleaner and preparation h and while those products don't seem to have much in common with each other or with chef boyardee there is one important trait they all share you've likely heard of them that's because american home products marketing division thrust many of these items including chef boyardee into the national television spotlight turning them into household names hector boyardee remained as a consultant for chef boyardee until 1978 and while he passed away at the age of 87 in 1985 his likeness is still displayed on the brand's packaging not bad for an 11 year old kitchen apprentice chef's significant contributions to milton pennsylvania were never forgotten in 2013 the town erected a statue honoring him at the entrance to the factory plant manager steve smith said at the time we have a great legacy my employees are so proud of the chef boyardee brand and the legacy of hector at the time the statue went up chef boyardee had provided jobs for more than ten thousand workers in the milton area as one employee said it's my livelihood put my kids through college chef boyardee continues to be invaluable to college students and any young person whose kitchen consists of nothing but a few plates and a microwave it's also remained a staple of pop culture say chef boyardee stop by our dead although there was one crossover that the company could not get behind the writers of the hit sitcom seinfeld had proposed featuring a chef boyardee product in one episode referencing real brands was a common practice on the show junior mint drake's coffee cake pez and snickers made their appearances it's a junior mint as did products like snapple dan and yogurt and of course lots and lots of cereals if the show's lawyers thought a company might take offense they would ask permission but according to writers most brands loved the attention even if products appeared in a less than favorable light we're on the bus go in the proposed boy rd script kramer lands a gig driving a horse-drawn handsome cab because this is a sitcom he also has a surplus of beefaroni due to some over-exuberant spending at a warehouse store i eat up i got 34 more cans feeds the excess pasta to his horse which makes the animal break wind uncontrollably to the disgust of his passengers chef boyardee wasn't thrilled with the joke so the beefaroni was changed to the fictional brand beforino but we all knew and we all know in 1996 american home products spun off its food division into international home foods whose products included chef boyardee goulden's mustard and other well-known brands with seemingly infinite shelf lives today chef boyardee products are produced by conagra one of the world's largest creepy sounding branded food companies which acquired international home foods in 2000 but chef boyardee still plays the classics beef ravioli spaghetti and meatballs beefaroni and lasagna plus a bunch of other flavor combinations in mini and overstuffed versions available in cans and microwavable cups that will burn the out of your mouth even at the lowest setting it's all part of the charm in addition the company sells pizza sauces and pizza kits and other fun pasta dishes like cheesy burger macaroni which sounds like a kid's lunchbox was in an accident and although chef hector may have been confused by the request back in the 1930s chef boyardee even makes cauliflower pasta for folks looking to cut carbs so there you have it after almost 100 years chef boyardee a dependable supermarket center aisle staple is still going strong and it all started with a real-life italian immigrant who spent almost his whole life in the kitchen and promised america a delicious dinner for only pennies a serving bravissimo chef bravo so what do you think what's your favorite boyardee dish let us know in the comments below and while you're at it check out some of these other videos from weird history food

Channel: Weird History Food

Views: 643,520

Keywords: who was the real chef boyardee, the history of chef boyardee, the real man behind chef boyardee, chef boyardee was a real person, chef boyardee's food history, weird history food, weird history famous foodies, chef boyardee, Ettore Boiardi, food history, corporate logos, boxed food history, Chef Boyardee SpaghettiOs, nostalgic food, the man behind the can, Chef Boyardee Ravioli, canned foods, famous chefs, recollection road, great big story, tasting history with max miller

Id: mvt9rU6ZqCw

Length: 12min 20sec (740 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 17 2022