What is your favorite Chef Boyardee offering? Always loved making the Chef Boyardee pizzas as a kid

As a kid, we were not a family of means as well as a single parent household, so my mom home cooked most of our meals with what she could afford. Every once in a while, when we had some extra money, she would bring home Chef Boyardee Ravioli and "make them fancy" for us by putting dried parsley on top, and baking stale hotdog buns in the oven with butter and garlic salt. I always thought to myself: "Man...this must be how rich people eat everyday!". Oh, to be a kid again.

The fact that he sold his company to make sure that his employees got adequate pay shows what kind of an employer he was; a damn good one.

My father was the only child of Hector Boiardi, growing up I was able to to eat the most delicious food freshly prepared. It has been a privilege to be part of this well loved family

Fun fact: Hector Boiardi is my great uncle. My father (who is now 80) grew up knowing him personally. Sometimes the family would get together and make Italian sausage (I recall a picture where the sausages were hanging in a basement and there is my dad in his early 20s alongside his brothers and the Chef himself). And no, we never got any money. His son Mario blew millions of his inheritance on B.S. real estate scams lol Another Fun Fact: my great uncle Hector is also the *only* American to have received the Order of Lenin for helping feed the WWII Soviet soldiers (who were allies at the time). Only recently did Russia redact that historical fact from public record, I suppose to rewrite history in any way possible to discount America's role in their nation's history or something, given Ukraine and all. Anyways, just thought I'd share these related tidbits about my family and the Chef. There's tons more stories my dad has told me over the years that I'm just forgetting at the moment, like how at Christmas time he would always bring the best cheesecake (I think it was cheesecake) and that his son, Mario, would do the same. Straight from Italy sorta cheesecakes. Real fancy stuff, I sometimes wish I had been alive to taste it. Also, had it not been for his factory, neither my great aunt Helen and he would have met, nor my grandma and grandpa. In other words, Chef Boyardee is the reason I'm alive today 😂 (boy I hope I'm remembering these stories correctly... would really suck to get thousands of upvotes and my dad find out I was wrong!)

Anyone growing up in Cleveland knew that Chef Boyardee was a real person as Mr Boiardi used to visit elementary schools in the area all the time just to tell his story and discuss American exceptionalism during the Cold War. We also knew that the stuff in the cans wasn’t the real genius of Mr Boiardi, but the recipes he would make on the local morning shows that were much more involved and delicious that truly showed this man knew how to cook.

I'm fairly certain that, without Chef Boyardee, I might have starved to death at some point.

One key thing left out of the story is that Chef Boyardee didn't have to sell the company. They scaled up and hired more employees to help with the war effort, but once the war ended the demand went down. Instead of firing the extra employees, Chef Boyardee cared so much about keeping them employed he sold the company.

The Chef helped me and my little family get through very difficult and turbulent times. You don’t get sick of anything when it’s all you’ve got to eat. People these days hate it But the same people who criticize it, were never in a position in where that was their only option. Food is food.

As a retail worker I can confirm the Chef sells extremely well. We go through cases everyday and the pizza kits? We cannot keep them on the shelves due to selling out so quickly. Plus I buy a can every once and a while for lunch for the nostalgia.

coming home for lunch as a kid in the 70's and having beefaroni on the table always made my day.

The epitome of the American dream. Rest In Peace, Hector.

I have raviolis, spaghettios & a pizza kit in my pantry right now! Long Live Chef Boyardee!!! 🍝🍝🍝 🇮🇹🇮🇹🇮🇹

The brand has been part of my entire life, so 60+ years. It was never gourmet food, but as a kid it was pure nectar! Great video, I knew absolutely NOTHING about this!

Everything said in this video agrees with my own family history: my grandmother, who was born and raised in central Pennsylvania, told me as a kid about how she knew Hector personally, as her farm was one of the ones that supplied tomatoes to him. (In fact, my mom was born just a few miles away from Milton.) Granny was always proud that her tomatoes had helped the war effort. Not long after WW2 ended, they sold the farm and moved to south Florida to help my grandfather’s ailing health. But Granny always remained a farm girl at heart, growing stuff in her garden and saying hello to the occasional wayward cow that would make its way into her yard from the nearby pasture.

Much respect. I ate Boyardee as a child, and then came back as an adult, eating these occasionally while working away. I love old Ma and Pa stories like this.

Chef Boyardee came out with retro cans of beefaroni and other pasta meals a few years ago. I actually liked the Beefaroni. It was supposed to have the old school ingredients, but it didn't really make much of a difference in taste. It was good though.

I will say this, my childhood consisted of mostly ravioli from the chef. I love these kinds of videos!

I always found the story of Hector Boiardi very interesting and inspiring

Mr. Boiardi was a legitimate Michelin-starred chef, and very proud of his family name. When he was approached to be the face of a canned food brand featuring his recipes, he insisted on using the phonetic spelling of his name so people would be saying it right. And yes, that is his face smiling at you from the label on the can even now.

i love that he was fr just a guy who loved to cook, no fancy culinary school, just years and years of effort and passion

I've almost never heated their products, just opened the can, grabbed a fork, and started eating

Two new Weird History videos in one day? We're spoiled.

I think it would be cool have a video about how Chinese takeout became popular. I love me some takeout! Also, this was a great video! The beef raviolis was a staple in my college days. Thanks, Chef!! ☺️

I knew he was a real chef before, but good god I didn't know he was a top level chef who owned an empire and had presidential honors. I bet you anything the original canned product back then was pretty really good, especially with fresh mushrooms.

I'm 36 make a comfortable living and I always have Chef Boyarde in my pantry. I find it comforting after a really bad day and you want some nostalgic cozy feelings.

I ate my share of Hector's grub. None of it sucked, either. I still enjoy a can of his ravioli from time to time. It's a convenience/comfort food for me these days. Not unlike fast food burgers - a rare treat.

I'm in my 60's now, and I still love me some Chef Boyardee ravioli. Regular, mini, overstuffed, you name it, I love it. It's been a favorite since I was only knee-high.

I really like his story. Very humble.

One thing I can say about Chef Boyardee is consistency. The only difference between all of his tomato-based canned pasta are the optics...same taste....same texture....everything from the beefaroni to the ravioli and everything in between. They all have the same flavor. One thing is for sure though! There is a marked difference between the Chef Boyardee brand and other name bands, as well as store bought brands. The proof is in the pasta! The quality is definitely there!

This guy was all of our childhoods.

I'm in my 40's, and recently bought a few cans of the ravioli for my daughter to mix up her repetitive summer lunches. She wasn't interested in giving it a chance, so I ended up eating them, and while it may be the nostalgia talking, I still dig it.

its a shame that the company did not keep the quality that the chef originally put into the recipes. my kids ate it when they were little, but none of us eat it now.

I love this canned deliciousness!! Since i was a child and im 53 now and still love it. Fast delicious lunch is what it will always be too me. There's always a few cans in my pantry at all times lol.

Chef Boyardee, one of my personal favorite things to get for lunch at work, cheap and filling. Always easy to pop open a can or two of the Ravioli and dig in

I love it. Nobody could pronounce "Boiardi" and he is a real hero. Everyone else being gangsters when he arrived and he makes awesome food instead. So many kids love him!

I would have loved to have had a plate cooked by him personally. He really is a man who cared for his craft.

Like Campbell's Soup was for Andy Warhol, Chef Boyardee brings back childhood memories and feels like home.

Should do a compilations of the history of cereal/children mascots. Or mascots that have been forgotten to time

I loved Chef Boyardee growing up. I still eat it from time to time, and I'm 26!

oh I really liked this one! :) hits close to home and my 20's LOL!

I still eat Chef Boyardee spaghetti and meatballs in the can. It has a lot of preservatives but hey, it tastes great with Fritos.

Not having grown up eating Chef Boyardee I nearly gagged when out of curiosity I tried a can of beefaroni many years ago. The mushy, overcooked “pasta” and putrid sauce turned me off the brand forever. The real chef however was certainly fascinating and I’m sure his actual food must’ve been pretty darn amazing. He probably wasn’t a fan of the canned interpretation of his culinary skills, but it sounds like it helped a lot of people out and did much for the local economy, so kudos to him. Thanks for the very interesting video, I’ll never look at those cans of food-like substance the same way again!

For people who think that Chef Boyardee canned products taste alike (they do lol) try the sauce that comes with the spaghetti kits. It’s worlds better than the sauce in the more well-known Chef products. Good stuff. I’ll even eat a box of it nowadays if I’m feeling emotional or lazy lol.

I used to make Chef Boyardee pizza at home all the time, we all loved it. Pepperoni was always my favorite, with the little pepperoni's in the sauce, but I eventually could only find the cheese and then it was gone for good. I don't know why they don't sell it here anymore, but I miss it.

Is Chef Boy-Ar-Dee Ravioli actually objectively GOOD? No, not really. Do I unashamedly love it all the same? Yes, please, can I have some more? A great American success story.

Love the history of CBAD... So much fun!! Delicious too!! Thank you for the story..🍝

What a wonderful story. I loved how he brought all those jobs to Milton, Penn. I never had any of his products, but heard of them before.

Growing up in a partially Italian family we never had canned or jarred sauce, but we would occasionally have Chef Boyardee cans in the pantry. The only ones I remember were ravioli and the pizza kits. And since microwaves weren't invented until I was nearing my teens, we had to wait MINUTES (can you belie it?!) for that stuff to heat up in a pan on the stove, so I would usually eat it right out of the can.

Their pizza wasa staple in my home. We were poor and as a cost efficient treat, my mom would have living room picnics with me snd my sis, with the pizza and we would watch the newlywed show (mid 80s). Good times....My mom was the best, made me appreciate the small things.

I grew up on Beefaroni and love it to this day. I was so happy when they brought the Throwback Series as there was a noticeable difference in taste and it reminded me of my days as a boy eating straight out of the can! Thanks for a great documentary.

I lived for Chef Boyardee meals as a child. I love the Overstuffed Ravioli. Hot, cold, in the can, I don't care. Boiardi is a hero, a true cultural icon.

I always keep a couple of cans in my desk drawer for an inexpensive, quick lunch

OMG. I love Chef Boyardee! I love the spaghetti and lasagna kits. Every Sunday we would have one or the other for lunch. They still have pizza kits around but I cannot find spaghetti or lasagna kits anywhere. Bring back some of the old stuff!!!!!

I'm no Chef, but Boyardees weird history food videos fascinating.

What a great American success story! It’s a testament to what vision and hard work can do.

It's crazy that the spaghetti, ravioli, lasagna, and beefaroni all have different tastes, but one bite and you feel good inside. You know it's Chef Boyardee's

Eating ravioli straight out of the can when I was piss drunk or just tired from cooking food all day will always be a part of my most cherished memories of my early 20s.

I would love to go back in time and taste the original Boyardee pasta sauce.

I’m not a fan of any of it anymore, but my kids love it. What a legacy!👍👍❤️🇨🇦

Maybe a video on origins of ramen noodles? It’s been in so many homes and helped so many 😄

Is that Bryan Cranston, in the Prep H commercial clip at 8:29? 😎 I've never liked Chef Boyardee products but was still super curious, so thanks for the video, WHF🙂

I'm 30 years old, and I still love this stuff. LoL.

One of my first taste memories in the early 1950's was Chef Boyardee spaghetti. In the 1960's we assembled their pizza kits every Friday night. 7 decades later, I have cases of Chef Boyardee as survival food. I see no problem at all eating their raviolis straight out of the can cold. I often create some pretty good dishes myself like a short order cook. A few years ago I started calling my home dishes Chef Boy-Am-I.

Growing up mom and grandma called me their chef boyardi because I always helped cook.

Can you do a Weird History Food on the rise and fall of Chi Chi’s franchise? I love the content on both channels.

Canned Chef Boyardee singles of beefaroni, Vienna sausages, Campbell's Soup-at-Hand, pouches of tuna/chicken, black coffee, MREs & Reese's Pieces got me through my deployment. I rarely got an ACTUAL hot meal, but honestly the nostaligia is something else for something so simple. 🥰🥰

I learned about Chef Boiardi as a young child in the 70s from the lady who did my mothers hair. She was older then and had grown up in Cleveland. Her family had some connection to the Chef and she spoke highly of him. I thought it was so cool that he was a real person and a famous Chef. I always enjoyed her stories about him, and Cleveland in general.

Quite literally the American dream in action. An amazing story to be told, and a heck of a backstory for something as simple as a canned good!

I wanna taste the mushroom sauce! I still love Beefaroni!

Soooo nice.As a 70's kid, I loved the ravioli and pizza kit was super fun. I should get some to put in my emergency pantry.

These are so much fun to watch and listen to. Thankyou for making these!

When I first moved out on my own, this was a large part of my diet. Now that I'm older, I still use it for dirty bulking. It's cheap and loaded with, well, everything. Love it.

After 52 years, I finally learned his first name. Also, one of my favorite things as a child was beef ravioli.

I absolutely love love these videos! Thank you! ♥️

Back in the mid 1900’s I met that man. He was a good man. He told me I would go on to do big things. I never did. I feel like I let him down. RIP Big BRDee

i’ll say it, i still enjoy it at 21 years old!

Yooooo I’ve discovered I have a deep interest and love for old marketing. Nothing takes me back to childhood like old commercials, in a way that not even those old shows can. So…been binging these food videos lately :)

Wanna know how much this food is a staple? I remember going to the store to stock up right before they officially announced lockdowns and the Chef Boyardees were CLEANED out. It took months before you could walk into the store and find more than two or three cans.

One of my favorite sitcom lines ever is from the Golden Girls: Rose: Sofia, this is so delcious that it tastes like Chef Boyardee. Sofia starts to smile thinking she is being complimented; but then stops and stares, and then huffs off with the pot.

I wonder what his original sauce tasted like! 😋

7:26 "Plus cans of Chef Boyardee could make formidable projectiles..." Agent 47 agrees. 😂

Great video! I still enjoy the odd can of Chef Boyardee today, as I expect most people who grew up on the lower end of the class system do.

This was my favorite Weird History Food video. Thanks, nostalgia. 🙃

I miss the boxed spaghetti dinner. Much better than the canned stuff.

I ate a pizza kit mix every day after school from grade 4 to end of high school. I was level 9 picky child. If the family wanted to go eat at a restaurant that I didn't like I would sit in the car. I'm eating a red baron pizza right now so I guess I still have issues.

I remember that commercial of the can who follows the girl home playing almost every day. "But I love chef"

At 32 I still get cravings when I see those cans and have to pick some up. Lunch for work a lot of the time. Still good and stayed the same since I was a kid. Always feel a bit of nostalgia

This man is a true American. I'll never forget eating the ravioli cans as a kid.

Back when I worked a different job and I didn't have time to make lunch, I'd grab a can of ravioli and a fork and just eat it room temp. Not a bad meal.

Such a wholesome history! Nice! :)

A+ video! Had no idea that he was so important to the history of the food we eat today! What a legend and a helpful person!

Beefaroni still is my favorite.

How about a video on the brand Van Camp? I remember way back in the day, they were Van de Camp -- I loved their pork 'n beans.

This was a great documentary - thank you. This was part of my upbringing!💐

The Chef is so sweet and cheerful, just seeing him makes me feel happier☀

When I saw your intro, it reminded me of something- What do Frosted Flakes and The Grinch have in common? Thurl Ravenscroft. He was both the voice of Tony the Tiger and sang the original song, 'You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch'.

As a non-american it's funny to learn about these household names I've never heard about. I've never had canned spaghetti in my life.

My childhood would not be the same without Chef Boyardee!!!!! The Ravioli was and still is My favorite!!!!!!🤗🤗🤗

Awesome