Anthony!") He soon found his way into the kitchen of New York's famous Plaza Hotel, with help from older brother Paul, who worked there as a matre d'. The rest is history. If ever a man was fit for that title, it was Boiardi. Chef Boiardi was awarded a Gold Star Order of Excellence from the United States War Department for supplying millions of rations for American and Allied troops during WWII. At the age of 11, he was working as an apprentice chef at local restaurant "La Croce Bianca", although his duties were confined to non-cooking odd jobs such as potato peeling and dealing with the trash. Chef Hector plays a major role on the home front by making food for the troops. Your email address will not be published. When I see cans of Chef Boyardee Lasagna, I think of ads using Weird Al Yankovics Lasagna as background music. Boiardi was survived by his wife Helen Wroblewski Boiardi, who eventually died in 1995, and his son Mario Boiardi, who in turn died in 2007. I wish they would bring back the older version of macaroni and cheese with the long noodles and white cheese sauce. Ettore Boiardi (October 22, 1897 - June 21, 1985), also known by the Anglicized name Hector Boyardee, was an Italian-American chef, famous for his eponymous brand of food products, named Chef Boyardee . Behind the label is a whole impressive history, beginning with the origins of Ettore Boiardi, who became Hector Boyardee . Behind The Man On The Can: An interview with Chef Boyardee's Grandniece As of 2021, the following products are no longer in production. There are plenty of brands out there that are named after real people, who once lived real lives and, in many cases, actually invented the product that's named after them. Well, a lot, actually. Behind the scenes at Chef Boyardee - The United Food & Commercial Later on, the company got sold to American Home Products in 1946, and then later it was turned over to the International Home Foods division in 1996. [18], In 2015, a class-action lawsuit was brought against the Chef Boyardee company. Behind the label is a whole impressive history, beginning with the origins of Ettore Boiardi, who became Hector Boyardee the chef we all know and love. Ettore Boiardi as shown in a 1953 television commercial, 1953 television commercial with Ettore Boiardi, Learn how and when to remove this template message, "Chef Boyardee Was a Real Person Who Brought Italian Food to America", "Hector Boiardi: A Chef's Resume | Chef Boyardee", "Carl Colombi served up Chef Boy-Ar-Dee idea", "The Man, The Can: Recipes Of The Real Chef Boyardee", "Hector Boiardi Is Dead: Began Chef Boy-ar-dee", "Hector Boiardi of 'Chef Boy-Ar-Dee' Foods Dies", "Chef Boyardee's grand-niece Anna Boiardi reveals family recipes with new cookbook", The Man, The Can: Recipes Of The Real Chef Boyardee, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ettore_Boiardi&oldid=1144495541, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles needing additional references from May 2022, All articles needing additional references, Wikipedia articles needing clarification from July 2020, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 14 March 2023, at 01:48. After immigrating to America at the age of 16, he got a job at New Yorks Plaza Hotel, according to NPRs All Things Considered. In short, Chef Boyardee was a real person. Chef Hector Boyardee was born in 1897 in Piacenza, Italy, not surprisingly with a very Italian name: Ettore Boiardi. In Milton, the company exploded. At the persuasion of a couple of restaurant regulars, including a couple who owned a local grocery store chain, Boiardi built a small canning and processing plant in Cleveland. Chef Boyardee is still on store shelves, but the Smurfs version is a thing of the past. Even though its now a household name, the people of still have very sentimental memories of Chef Boyardee. But he remains one the most recognized faces of TV, thanks to his legacy of advertisement. The classic ready-made pastas are iconic and well known. Chef Hector retires from his consultant position. After a stint in prison for continuing to harass and pillage the Spanish after a peace treaty was signed, he was knighted and appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Jamaica. At this point in history, fine dining was synonymous with French food, according to NPR. By the late 1930s, Hector was headed east to set up his kitchen in Milton, Pennsylvania . Betty Crocker was not. In less-racist mascot falsification, Betty Crocker was the product of a Saturday Evening Post contest, and KFC's Colonel Harlan Sanders never actually earned the military rank that many misattribute to him. Who Was the Real Chef Boyardee? - YouTube The dish was so popular that patrons wanted to make it for themselves at home, so Boiardi began to assemble take-out meal kits that included dried pasta, cheese and cleaned milk bottles filled with marinara sauce along with instructions on how to cook, heat and assemble the meal. Cookie Policy One of the more famous he worked at as a youth was New Yorks famous Plaza and Ritz-Carlton hotel. However, there was one tiny detail to figure out. Real. The rechristened companys first factory was located in Milton, Pennsylvania, writes NPR. ", By 1936, the company had outgrown the Cleveland plant and moved to a large swath of land in Milton, Pennsylvania where they could grow their own tomatoes. Boiardi originally grew his trademark mustache to try to make himself look older as he was generally the youngest cook in the often top notch restaurants where he was a cook at, starting around 16 when he moved to America. 1. The Chef Boyardee brand was created by a real Italian chef, Ettore Boiardi. Known affectionately as 'Chef Boyardee,' he founded his food franchise of products with his wife, Helen. The most interesting brand names based on fictitious people, by far, are those that were devised with the express purpose of playing up the concept of "idealized domesticity," which was a big marketing trend around the turn of the 20th century. Weird History Food will follow Chef from his humble beginnings as an. To woo potential clients, hed send them packages of his home-made cookies. So he changed his last name's spelling to make it easier to pronounce, slapped it on a can, and boom, Chef Boyardee was born. Below is a 1953 commercial featuring Chef Boyardee: And below the commercial from the 50s, is the whole history behind the Boyardee name: What do you think of the history behind the Chef Boyardee name? He was invented by the Doyle Dane Bernbach ad agency in 1959, to appear in advertisements for the . This is a young man on the move. I needed that information for ia project I am doing on Chef Boyardee. Converted Rice Inc. supplied rice to the American military during World War II, and the owners wanted a new brand name and image when they started focusing on civilian consumers towards the end of the war. When he began selling jars and cans of his tomato sauce, he chose to do so under a name that Americans could pronounce more easily: "Chef Boy-Ar-Dee" (later changed to Chef Boyardee). He later immigrating to America at the age of 16 and took the name Hector Boiardi as he passed through Ellis Island. When it comes to food brands and their human "mascots," you really can't believe everything you see. I was at a friends house and his father was an actual good friend of the Chef. During the Depression, Boiardis company grew by leaps and bounds due to the fact that his product was incredibly cheap compared to most other meals and was very tasty (one assumes more tasty than now back then when Boiardi was directly involved in the production and quality control). Chef Boyardee. Ettore's journey from immigrant to figurehead of a burgeoning canned pasta empire is enough to store even a cynic's wavering faith in the American dream. Did you know this already? So he changed his last name's spelling to make it easier to pronounce, slapped it on a can, and boom, Chef Boyardee was born. The name was created for the Washburn Crosby Company (which would later merge with other businesses to form General Mills) by Marjorie Husted as a way to personalize the companys products and customer relations. As Anna Boiardi told NPR in 2011, they were the largest importers of Parmesan cheese from Italy. With the stock market crashing a year after the company's launch, the Great Depression was a boon for Chef Boyardee and its inexpensive, prepackaged meals, which helped to bring Italian food to the masses. Advertising Notice At first, the revised name was Boy-ar-dee, a phonetic spelling of how the family name was pronounced. It then expanded when the production was moved to Milton, Pennsylvania, and there, the Chef Boyardee empire was born. Kat Eschner is a freelance science and culture journalist based in Toronto. Did all the can move on their own? Although the product sold well, the company name was a sticking point. Get all the top food rankings, new product reviews, and other grocery content delivered to your inbox every other week. He was still a teenager. Maybe real. [9][10] His last appearance in a television commercial promoting the brand aired in 1979. Chef Boyardee was a real person. Husted picked the first name Betty because it sounded warm and friendly, and combined it with Crocker as a tribute to retired Washburn Crosby executive William Crocker. After immigrating to America at the age of 16, he got a job at New Yorks Plaza Hotel, And during those years, Boiardi also directed the catering for Woodrow Wilsons. So he changed his last name's spelling to make it easier to pronounce, slapped it on a can, and boom, Chef Boyardee was born. REAL: An Italian immigrant, Chef Ettore Boiardi had a restaurant in Cleveland. The company specialized in three flavors of sauces: traditional, mushroom, and spicy Naples-style. Before Tim and Nina Zagat, there was Duncan Hines, a traveling . Chef Boyardee Was a Real Person - Today I Found Out Famous Grave of Chef Boyardee All Souls Cemetery Chardon Ohio In 1928, as we said already, Ettore and his two brothers founded "Chef Boyardee," a food company specialized in the production and commercialization of Italian style ready-to-eat meals.
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