I don’t think I could choke this stuff down today if I had to…
But growing up with a Mother who couldn’t- or wouldn’t- cook anything edible, we would have starved without Chef Boyardee!
Unlike the friendly but fictional food faces of Betty Crocker, Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben, Chef Boyardee — that jovial, mustachioed Italian chef — is real. Ettore “Hector” Boiardi (that’s how the family really spells it) founded the company with his brothers in 1928, after the family immigrated to America from Italy.
Though America came to know him as Chef Boyardee — in the apron and trademark tall hat — Anna Boiardi knew him simply as Uncle Hector. Anna carried on her family’s culinary tradition; her new book, Delicious Memories, is part cookbook, part family history and part homage to her ancestors — immigrants who made their way in a new country.
via The Man, The Can: Recipes Of The Real Chef Boyardee : NPR.
Lost in the 21st Century 