Speaker 1: You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
Speaker 1: and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Guess what, Mango, what's that? Well, you know I love numbers,
Speaker 2: so I'm going to start out with a big number here.
Speaker 2: Did you know that there are over three hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty different pasta shapes? Mango, I didn't know that, which
Speaker 2: means there are over three hundred and fifty different pasta
Speaker 2: shape names. That's really what I'm getting at here, each
Speaker 2: with its own backstories. So you want to hear one
Speaker 2: of my favorites.
Speaker 1: Obviously I want to hear because this would have been.
Speaker 2: A very short episode if you're like, no, not really
Speaker 2: really in the mood for one of those this today?
Speaker 2: Not the carbs, Yeah, not carbs today. All right, So
Speaker 2: this story is all about Kava Tapi, which is that long,
Speaker 2: loose spiral, and it turns out it was originally called Chillin'
Speaker 2: Tani after an Italian pop star, So tell me, what.
Speaker 1: Does a pop star have to do with pasta?
Speaker 2: So cell and Tani was originally created by the company Gorilla,
Speaker 2: but it was a mistake. It happened because of a
Speaker 2: problem with aposthadize that they were using. So those are
Speaker 2: the molds that you feed the dough through to give
Speaker 2: the final producted shape. And so in the nineteen sixties,
Speaker 2: Brilla had some dyes that were supposed to have these
Speaker 2: very straight lines but accidentally ended up with curvy ones.
Speaker 2: So workers fed the dough through and out came this
Speaker 2: new corkscrew shape. Now, because the shape was springy, it
Speaker 2: reminded people of the company of the singer Andreano Cellantano,
Speaker 2: who was known for his high energy bouncy dancing. So
Speaker 2: Brilla trademarked the name cell and Tani and they are
Speaker 2: selling it under that name today. And the shape became
Speaker 2: so popular that other companies wanted to get in on
Speaker 2: this game, but they actually couldn't use Gorilla's trademark, so
Speaker 2: they called it Kava tapi, which comes from the Italian
Speaker 2: word for corkscrew. But actually, here's a little bon this
Speaker 2: fact for you. The most popular pasta shape in the
Speaker 2: United States is something much more straightforward than a corkscrew. It's,
Speaker 2: of course, spaghetti, which can be translated as little strings.
Speaker 1: Well, first of all, I want to say how amazing
Speaker 1: it is. The Brilla tried to make a straight pasta
Speaker 1: and it ended up permed total.
Speaker 2: Perm must have been a humid that day.
Speaker 1: But I also love the idea that spaghetti translates as
Speaker 1: little strings. Does that mean that like a single piece
Speaker 1: of spaghetti is actually a spaghetto?
Speaker 2: That is absolutely what it means. So now you can
Speaker 2: go to Italy and order a single noodle, just like
Speaker 2: all the locals do there.
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone can stop at just one foodle
Speaker 1: But in addition to being delicious, all this pasta is
Speaker 1: packed with history, which is the best flavor of all.
Speaker 1: So today on the show, we've gotten nine fact about
Speaker 1: Italian pasta. So grab your fourth and that's not even an.
Speaker 2: Hey, their podcast listener is welcome to part time Genius.
Speaker 2: I'm Will Pearson Ennis Always. I'm here with my good
Speaker 2: friend Mangush hot ticket here and over there in the
Speaker 2: booth dressed up. It took me a minute, but he's
Speaker 2: dressed up like a Pizza Hut restaurant with a red
Speaker 2: roof hat. It's really it's impressive. Actually, it's our pal
Speaker 2: and producer Dylan Fagan, always surprising us.
Speaker 1: I think that's from the Pizza Hut stunt where they
Speaker 1: claimed they were changing their name to Pasta Hut.
Speaker 2: Do you remember I actually actually don't. But is that
Speaker 2: a real thing?
Speaker 1: Yeah? It was an April Fool's joke and they talked
Speaker 1: about changing all their names, and people were outraged or excited,
Speaker 1: depending on how much they love pasta. But I love
Speaker 1: that Dylan picked up on it.
Speaker 2: That's pretty amazing.
Speaker 1: So will are you a big pasta eater?
Speaker 2: I love pasta so so so much, how about you?
Speaker 1: So much that every time I go for a business lunch,
Speaker 1: I tell myself I'm gonna order the salad, and then
Speaker 1: I just end up with like a bowl of bread.
Speaker 2: It's too hard not to have.
Speaker 1: No willpower for the stuff. But here is my first fact.
Speaker 1: So I want to address a question I know people
Speaker 1: would be asking, which is what is the difference between
Speaker 1: pasta and noodles. Now I've heard some folks say that
Speaker 1: pasta is Italian and noodles are from other cuisines, like
Speaker 1: Chinese rice noodles or Korean sweet potato noodles. But for
Speaker 1: the purposes of this episode, we are going with the
Speaker 1: Oxford English Dictionaries definition, and the OED defines a noodle
Speaker 1: as quote a string or ribbon like piece of pasta
Speaker 1: or similar flour paste, sometimes containing egg, typically cooked in
Speaker 1: liquid and served either in a soup or as an
Speaker 1: accompaniment to another dish.
Speaker 2: So noodles can be a type of pasta, but they
Speaker 2: aren't always.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So the oed goes on to define pasta as quote,
Speaker 1: especially an Italian cookery thin strands, sheets, or other shapes
Speaker 1: of dome made from Durham wheat and water, sometimes enriched
Speaker 1: with egg, usually sold dried and cooked in boiling water.
Speaker 2: All right, So by this definition, spaghetti is a type
Speaker 2: of noodle and a type of pasta. And something like
Speaker 2: pusilli obviously is a pasta, but not a noodle, is
Speaker 2: that right?
Speaker 1: That's right? And rice noodles are noodles, but they're not
Speaker 1: pasta because they're not Italian and they're also not made
Speaker 1: from this particular type of wheat.
Speaker 2: Got it understood?
Speaker 1: So we might get some emails about this, but that's
Speaker 1: where we stand. And speaking of strong opinions, we ask
Speaker 1: people to tell us about their favorite pasta shapes. And
Speaker 1: this is so much fun. A lot of folks talked
Speaker 1: about sauce grabability as their number one factor in determining this.
Speaker 1: Our friend Doug Mack, who writes the Great Snackstack Newsletter
Speaker 1: which everyone should subscribe to said he loves fettuccini because
Speaker 1: you can wrap it around a fork, but unlike spaghetti,
Speaker 1: it's flat, so sauce sticks to it better. Over on
Speaker 1: Blue Sky, someone with the user named gravel Influencer, which
Speaker 1: I also really love, describes themselves as a hardcore fan
Speaker 1: of Jammelli. Again for sauce reasons. Stacey chose Campanelle, and
Speaker 1: I have to admit I'd never heard of that one.
Speaker 1: It is a cone with ruffled edge and the name
Speaker 1: means little bells, but it's also known as trumpetti or
Speaker 1: trump bits and I actually have a picture of this.
Speaker 1: It's amazing. You can see how sauce would really get
Speaker 1: right down there in the horn part. Man, I want
Speaker 1: to eat that, I know I want. I actually want
Speaker 1: like a pasta Biles Davis, steady kind. Another one I
Speaker 1: had to look up was Strozza Preete, which actually was
Speaker 1: mentioned by a few folks on Blue Sky. Strotza prete
Speaker 1: means priest strangler.
Speaker 2: Priest strangler, what? Why does it mean? That?
Speaker 1: It is a long hand rolled tube shape kind of
Speaker 1: like cavatelli. Apparently the name reflects local opinions about greedy
Speaker 1: priest from a time when the Catholic Church owned most
Speaker 1: of the land and charge farmers high rent. There's also
Speaker 1: the user ham Hawk, who shouted out cascatelli, which of
Speaker 1: course is the curved ruffled shape invented by Dan Pashman
Speaker 1: on his pcast. And I love this response from Faisal,
Speaker 1: who said there is no best pasta shape. They're all
Speaker 1: beautiful and it depends on the sauce. And although we
Speaker 1: didn't ask about this, a few people did tell us
Speaker 1: about their least favorite pasta shape. A listener named Oriole
Speaker 1: wrote to say that spaghetti is just too thick, angel
Speaker 1: hair and vermicelli are better, and over on Blue Sky,
Speaker 1: user l nk Joe said the worst shape is obviously
Speaker 1: rakeete or rackets, and he shared a photo and they
Speaker 1: literally look like tennis rackets. Yeah, so even as a
Speaker 1: tennis fan, it feels like more like a gimmick than
Speaker 1: a proper delivery vehicle for all the red sauce I want,
Speaker 1: so I agree with them.
Speaker 2: I'm looking at this now it actually reminds me. I
Speaker 2: don't know, I haven't thought about this in a while,
Speaker 2: but like all the different shapes in the I probably
Speaker 2: shouldn't be admitting this, but I ate a ton of
Speaker 2: Chef Boyarty as a kid Mango. You know, all the
Speaker 2: parents at were pull out those microwave Chef Boyardy all
Speaker 2: sorts of fun, crazy shapes. I don't think I remember
Speaker 2: like a sports win, but this feel like it would
Speaker 2: fit right in. Do you have a favorite shape of pasta?
Speaker 1: I mean, my shapes are so boring. I really love
Speaker 1: taglia and buccatini because they are just from times in
Speaker 1: my life when they were comfort food, you know, like
Speaker 1: when we started Metal Flass, I was working at this
Speaker 1: Italian restaurant in Durham called Tusca, and the chefs used
Speaker 1: to make me this incredible Spanish tagle itally and it
Speaker 1: was just really wonderful. And so I think about that
Speaker 1: a lot.
Speaker 2: All right, mego, since you cleared up the noodles versus
Speaker 2: pasta controversy, I'm going to open up another can of
Speaker 2: worms here, which sounds like an avant garden noodle dish,
Speaker 2: But I'm going to tackle the question of where noodles
Speaker 2: originated and how they came to be associated with Italian cuisine.
Speaker 2: So for a long time, there was this myth that
Speaker 2: persisted that Marco Polo brought noodles from China to Italy.
Speaker 2: This was back during the thirteenth century. Now, this story
Speaker 2: spread after it was published in nineteen twenty nine in
Speaker 2: the Macaroni Journal, the United States official trade journal for
Speaker 2: pasta manufacture. I can't believe, after all our years of
Speaker 2: magazine publishing, we'd never heard of the Macaroni Journal.
Speaker 1: I know, I both want to see a copy of
Speaker 1: the Macaroni Journal, and I also can't believe that the
Speaker 1: distinguished Macaroni Journal made an error.
Speaker 2: I guess they didn't have a strong fact checking team.
Speaker 2: But weirdly, the Marco Polo story is pretty easy to disprove.
Speaker 2: Decades before Marco Polo embarked on his journey, Muslim geographer
Speaker 2: Ali Dresi wrote about pasta being made in Sicily. Also,
Speaker 2: noodles and pasta have been eaten for thousands of years,
Speaker 2: so it's impossible to say for certain who invented them.
Speaker 2: They hold an important place in cuisines across Europe, Asia
Speaker 2: and North Africa. However, the oldest known direct evidence of
Speaker 2: noodles does come from northwest China, where in two thousand
Speaker 2: and five archaeologists found a four thousand year old bowl
Speaker 2: of noodles. They were made of millet and had been
Speaker 2: miraculously preserved in a sealed bowl. How cool is that.
Speaker 1: I love that they found this like ancient tupperware with
Speaker 1: like lunch leftovers in it. But tell me, if all
Speaker 1: these people are eating pasta noodles, how did it become
Speaker 1: Italy signature dish?
Speaker 2: Well, Southern Italy grows a lot of Durham wheat, this
Speaker 2: high protein wheat that makes dough that's easy to shape,
Speaker 2: and pasta with a nice chewy bite to it. So
Speaker 2: by the Middle Ages, pasta was an important part of
Speaker 2: Italian cuisine, and Sicily was one of the world's largest
Speaker 2: producers of dried pasta, But it was really a delicacy
Speaker 2: for wealthy people. It was served at things like banquets
Speaker 2: and festive meals. This changed by the seventeenth century, when
Speaker 2: machines like the dough press made pasta easier to produce,
Speaker 2: so at that point pasta became food for more common people,
Speaker 2: especially since it was cheaper than meat.
Speaker 1: I love watching how food filters down right, like peanut
Speaker 1: butter was fancy and served at these elegant cafes and
Speaker 1: things like that, And now everyone survives on peanut butter.
Speaker 1: It's for the masses. But you know, pasta might be
Speaker 1: easy to make, but it doesn't grow on trees. And
Speaker 1: yet in nineteen fifty the BBC convinced a whole lot
Speaker 1: of people that it does. So on April first of
Speaker 1: that year, the TV channel aired their flagship news program Panorama.
Speaker 1: But this broadcast was pretty unusual. It showed a family
Speaker 1: in Switzerland doing their March spaghetti harvest where they were
Speaker 1: pulling these strands of spaghetti from trees and according to
Speaker 1: the voiceover of reporter Richard Dimbleby, this was a great
Speaker 1: year for Swiss spaghetti harvesters thanks to a mild winter
Speaker 1: and the disappearance of the spaghetti weavil. Wow, I think
Speaker 1: it's just so funny. Eight million people watched this phony
Speaker 1: broadcast and it said to be one of the first
Speaker 1: times TV was used to play in April Fool's Day prank.
Speaker 2: That is wild, but really, like, did anybody actually believe
Speaker 2: this was real?
Speaker 1: So many people, like hundreds of people called the BBC
Speaker 1: to ask if they could buy a spaghetti tree, which
Speaker 1: you know sounds ludicrous, But Richard Dimblebee was one of
Speaker 1: the UK's most prominent reporters, so having his voice on
Speaker 1: the broadcast gave it this real credibility. And the show's producer,
Speaker 1: David Wheeler put it this way. Dimblebee had quote enough
Speaker 1: gravitas to float an aircraft carrier.
Speaker 2: So it's kind of like having Walter Cronk tighten on
Speaker 2: your prank exactly.
Speaker 1: And people also weren't eating a lot of spaghetti in
Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties in Britain. When they did, it often
Speaker 1: came in a can, so they didn't spend much time
Speaker 1: thinking about where it came from. Plus the broadcast looked
Speaker 1: really incredible. The BBC went all out. They sent a
Speaker 1: cameraman to Switzerland. He got great shots of like fake
Speaker 1: spaghetti trees and people gathering the crop to put in
Speaker 1: their wicker baskets. It's really amazing. But not everyone found
Speaker 1: the hoax funny. David Wheeler actually explained that some people
Speaker 1: were embarrassed when they believed it, and their friends and
Speaker 1: families made fun of them. Other viewers, of course, thought
Speaker 1: it was hilarious either way. It has since become one
Speaker 1: of the most iconic April Fools pranks ever.
Speaker 2: I love it all right, Well, we have to take
Speaker 2: a quick break but when we come back, here's what
Speaker 2: we've got in store. We've got his prison escape, we've
Speaker 2: got the world's rarest noodle, and Italy's pasta purity law,
Speaker 2: so don't go anywhere.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Part Time Genius, where we're counting down
Speaker 1: nine facts about Italian pasta. But we do have some
Speaker 1: exciting non pasta related news, which is that we have
Speaker 1: a limited quality of official numbered Part Time Genius membership
Speaker 1: cards and we are going to send one to you
Speaker 1: for free if you send us your name, mailing address
Speaker 1: and one fun fact. The fun fact is important. You
Speaker 1: can send us a DM on Instagram or blue Sky.
Speaker 1: You can email High Geniuses at gmail dot com. That's
Speaker 1: Hi Geniuses at gmail dot com. Or you can leave
Speaker 1: us a message at three oh two four oh five
Speaker 1: five nine two five, and we will probably share your
Speaker 1: fact on an upcoming episode, but we will not share
Speaker 1: your contact infus. So that is a promise we can
Speaker 1: make to our listeners and it's just between us and
Speaker 1: the post office.
Speaker 2: All right, Well, that's pretty exciting stuff. And actually what
Speaker 2: do these membership cards do?
Speaker 1: Well, First of all, they show you a member. They
Speaker 1: also look cool in your wallet, on your bulletin board
Speaker 1: or in a frame over your couch.
Speaker 2: I mean, the options are so many options, and all
Speaker 2: that for zero dollars. I mean it's a real bargain,
Speaker 2: all right, Mega. Now that the self promotion is over,
Speaker 2: I think it's time to get back to.
Speaker 1: The PASTA great, what do you have, Froze next?
Speaker 2: I've got one word. Casanova said, you know much about
Speaker 2: this guy?
Speaker 1: I just know you know this modern meaning as kind
Speaker 1: of a ladies man.
Speaker 2: Well, I think that's true of many people. And that's
Speaker 2: a shame, because before Jacomo Casanova got reduced to his
Speaker 2: dating life, he was really interesting. He was born in
Speaker 2: Italy in seventeen twenty five, went on to have these
Speaker 2: crazy adventures. He traveled all over Europe, worked for Frederick
Speaker 2: the Second, was a spy, introduced the lottery to Paris,
Speaker 2: and created a notable translation of the Iliad. All along
Speaker 2: the way he hobnobbed with Voltaire, Catherine the Great, Benjamin Franklin.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is kind of a wild background. He's
Speaker 2: often described as an adventurer, which is a descriptor we
Speaker 2: just don't see enough in modern times. But I should
Speaker 2: copy out that most of what we know about Casanova
Speaker 2: comes from his own writing, and so experts say some
Speaker 2: of it might be just a tad embellished.
Speaker 1: I mean, it sounds like he genuinely had this impressive life.
Speaker 1: It's weird that he was like gilding his stories.
Speaker 2: The point is this next anecdote comes from Casanova, so
Speaker 2: take it with a grain of salt. But here is
Speaker 2: what he tells us. It was seventeen fifty five, he
Speaker 2: was thirty years old, and Casanova was sentenced to five
Speaker 2: years in a Venetian prison for being a con man,
Speaker 2: slash astrologer, slash gambler, slash a bunch of other disreputable
Speaker 2: stuff in the eighteenth century worldview. So a lot going
Speaker 2: on here. But luckily, in prison he has access to
Speaker 2: a sharpened iron bar, which he then uses to start
Speaker 2: chipping a hole in the wall of his cell you know,
Speaker 2: Shawshank redemption style and everything. But as he's about to finish,
Speaker 2: he gets moved to another cell. So now in order
Speaker 2: to make his escape, he has to bring an accomplice,
Speaker 2: a disgraced friar who's willing to keep working on the
Speaker 2: hole in the wall. But Casanova has to get him
Speaker 2: the iron bar somehow. So first he tries hiding it
Speaker 2: in a Bible, but the book doesn't quite cover the
Speaker 2: ends of it. So he fixes up this massive plate
Speaker 2: of macaroni, parmesan, cheese, and butter to put on top
Speaker 2: of the bible, and he hands the whole thing to
Speaker 2: a guard to deliver to his friend. Now, the guard
Speaker 2: is so focused on trying to keep the pasta from
Speaker 2: spilling that he doesn't notice what's going on under the plate.
Speaker 2: I have no idea how this would go unnoticed.
Speaker 1: I know, instead of just asking for a bigger Bible,
Speaker 1: right right exactly. I also love that, like inmates in
Speaker 1: Italian prisons are just making plates of pasta whatever they want.
Speaker 2: As soon as I saw that, it was like, so,
Speaker 2: how did he have access to all this stuff? I mean,
Speaker 2: if they didn't good solos, they might have been able
Speaker 2: to do it in the old days too. But you know,
Speaker 2: like I said, we don't have the most reliable sourcing
Speaker 2: for this. And whether or not the pasta story is true,
Speaker 2: it is true that Casanova and his friar were the
Speaker 2: only people ever known to escape that prison.
Speaker 1: How ridiculous would you feel if you're the guard who
Speaker 1: got fooled by the old plate of macaroni truck. Yeah
Speaker 1: under the macaroni. Well. Another important eighteenth century figure in
Speaker 1: the world of pasta is Francesco Leonardi, who gets credit
Speaker 1: as being the first person to combine pasta with tomato sauce.
Speaker 1: Obviously genius, and this comes from his cookbook Lapicchio moden
Speaker 1: or No. The recipe is called macaroni in the style
Speaker 1: of Naples, and in the first edition of the book,
Speaker 1: published in seventeen ninety, the recipe reads quote, cook macaroni
Speaker 1: with water and salt, and when it's three quarters done,
Speaker 1: grain and mix it in an earthenware terine with grated parmesan,
Speaker 1: crushed pepper, and a sauce of veal or other beef
Speaker 1: or a good broth from a stew, either plain or
Speaker 1: with cloves strained through a sieve.
Speaker 2: Now centuries later, that still sounds delicious, but he doesn't
Speaker 2: mention tomatoes.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so history was actually made with the second edition,
Speaker 1: which came out eighteen years later, and in that version
Speaker 1: of the recipe, after the cloths and before the straining,
Speaker 1: Leonardo added the groundbreaking phrase made with tomato sauce, So
Speaker 1: that note changed pasta forever.
Speaker 2: We all owe him a great dead Now, as long
Speaker 2: as we're talking about noteworthy recipes, let me tell you
Speaker 2: about the rarest most challenging pasta recipe in the world.
Speaker 2: It's called Threads of God.
Speaker 1: I feel like they plagiarized that name from my fashion
Speaker 1: label that I'm starting, but I love how intimidating it sounds.
Speaker 2: Well, it is intimidating. So the dish comes from the
Speaker 2: village of Lula in Sardinia, where it's known as sufielin Deu. Now,
Speaker 2: for three hundred years, only women in that region knew
Speaker 2: how to make this pasta. The recipe was passed down
Speaker 2: from mother to for centuries. As far as how it's made,
Speaker 2: it starts with semolina flour made from local Durham wheat,
Speaker 2: and they combine that with salt and water. Then they stretch, fold,
Speaker 2: and loop the dough until it becomes two hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty six individual threads that are extremely delicate, even thinner
Speaker 2: than angel hair. Now, after this time consuming process, the
Speaker 2: threads get layered to form a sort of a like
Speaker 2: a woven sheet. Now, then the sheets get dried in
Speaker 2: the sun, smashed up, cooked in mutton broth, and served
Speaker 2: with cheese.
Speaker 1: So I get where the threads come from. But what
Speaker 1: is the religious significance.
Speaker 2: Well, traditionally those noodles are only made for the Feast
Speaker 2: of San Francesco. The dish was served to Christians who
Speaker 2: made the pilgrimage to Lula for these celebrations. So it's
Speaker 2: a special occasion meal, which makes sense given how difficult
Speaker 2: it is to make. Now, I'm sure you're wondering, how
Speaker 2: can I try this dish? But the bad news is
Speaker 2: gorilla engineers once tried to build a machine that would
Speaker 2: produce the noodles commercially, and it was a total failure.
Speaker 2: Remember back to when they try to just make a
Speaker 2: straight pasta ended up curly. That was always a way
Speaker 2: too confusing. So the good news is that the women
Speaker 2: who know how to make the threads of God have
Speaker 2: begun sharing their recipe so that it doesn't die out.
Speaker 2: There's even a restaurant in West Hollywood called Stella that
Speaker 2: actually serves it.
Speaker 1: Oh man, we need to make a trip. That's right
Speaker 1: near the Daily Zeikai studio. That's right, okay. So I
Speaker 1: am glad you mentioned Semlina flower because my next fact
Speaker 1: is all about how Italy cracked down on pasta ingredients.
Speaker 1: So as ladies in Lula know Semolina flower is ground
Speaker 1: from Durham wheat, and that ends up being the gold
Speaker 1: standard for pasta. It's this coarse flower that's considered hard
Speaker 1: because of its high protein content. But the truth is
Speaker 1: you can make pasta from other types of flour, and
Speaker 1: that's why in nineteen sixty seven, Italy passeda pasta purity
Speaker 1: law that required all dried pasta sold in Italy to
Speaker 1: be made with Durham wheat.
Speaker 2: So it was literally against the law to sell any
Speaker 2: other kind.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and this actually lasted until the late nineteen eighties
Speaker 1: when this German pasta manufacturer named three Glocan got hit
Speaker 1: with a fine for selling pasta. Their pasta contained a
Speaker 1: mixture of Durham wheat and a common wheat, and they
Speaker 1: were selling it in Italian stores. Now three Glocan took
Speaker 1: the Italian government to court in what became known as
Speaker 1: the Pasta Wars, and in nineteen eighty eight, the European
Speaker 1: Economic Community's Court of Justice sided with three Glocken. They
Speaker 1: ruled that the pasta purity law couldn't ban foreign pasta imports,
Speaker 1: though it could impose Durham wheat requirements on Italian pasta makers.
Speaker 1: So in twenty twenty one, Italy doubled down with the
Speaker 1: Italian Presidential Decree number one hundred and eighty seven, which
Speaker 1: affirms that Italian made drive pasta must be made with
Speaker 1: Durham wheat semolina. That's actually been a boon for Italy's
Speaker 1: wheat growers, because today Italian pasta contains about seventy percent
Speaker 1: domestic Durham wheat and only thirty percent imported.
Speaker 2: I'll keep that in mind if I ever decided to
Speaker 2: open a pasta business in Italy, of course. But we've
Speaker 2: got one last fact, and it involves food mascots, so
Speaker 2: you know, like the Jolly Green Giant, the kool Aid
Speaker 2: Man and mister Peen out of course, none of whom, unfortunately,
Speaker 2: are real people. But there's one food mascot who was
Speaker 2: a real person. Mentioned him earlier, Chef Boyrd. So his
Speaker 2: real name was Ettore Boyardi. His last name is spelled Boiardi,
Speaker 2: and you'll notice the emphasis on the middle syllable, not
Speaker 2: the last. So Ettore, who went by the name Hector,
Speaker 2: was actually born in northwest Italy in eighteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2: By age eleven, he already had a job working at
Speaker 2: a hotel, and after immigrating to the US at age sixteen,
Speaker 2: he got a job at the Plaza hotel in New York.
Speaker 2: Within a year, he was the head chef there. I mean,
Speaker 2: this is sixteen years old or seventeen, I guess by
Speaker 2: the time he had this Jesob It's crazy. So he
Speaker 2: started incorporating Italian dishes into the menu, which was pretty
Speaker 2: unusual during this time when French food was considered the
Speaker 2: epitome of gourmet cuisine. Because his career took off, Hector
Speaker 2: even catered President Woodrow Wilson's second wedding when he got
Speaker 2: married to Edith Glt in nineteen fifteen.
Speaker 1: That feels like such an incredible success story. So how
Speaker 1: did Chef Boyardi become Chef Boyardi?
Speaker 2: Hector moved to Cleveland and opened a restaurant with his wife, Helen.
Speaker 2: It was called Il Giardino di Italia or The Garden
Speaker 2: of Italy, and it was a hit. So their signature
Speaker 2: dish was spaghetti with sauce and cheese, which customers loved
Speaker 2: so much that the restaurant started offering take home kits
Speaker 2: so people could cook it themselves at any time. Now
Speaker 2: the popularity of their takeout business led Hector, Helen, and
Speaker 2: Hector's brothers to launch the Chef Boyardy Food Company in
Speaker 2: nineteen twenty eight. Now, to make things simpler for American customers,
Speaker 2: they changed the spelling of their name to the one
Speaker 2: that we know today. But when the family wanted to
Speaker 2: open a factory for their ready made Italian meals, they
Speaker 2: had a little bit of a dilemma. So Italian food
Speaker 2: still wasn't very common in the US at the time,
Speaker 2: so they had to pick a strategic location in order
Speaker 2: to access the right ingredients. They landed on Milton, Pennsylvania
Speaker 2: because there was a nearby tomato supplier, so they grew
Speaker 2: their own mushrooms inside the factory and in the nineteen thirties,
Speaker 2: shep Boyarty was the country's largest importer of Italian parmesan cheese.
Speaker 2: So the brand grows and it grows, and in nineteen
Speaker 2: forty two, after the US military commission Boyarty for army rations,
Speaker 2: the Milton factory ran twenty four hours a day just
Speaker 2: to meet demand. At its peak, the factory turned out
Speaker 2: two hundred and fifty thousand cans of Shepeoyardy every single day.
Speaker 2: That would have made thirteen year old Will's mouth water
Speaker 2: so much.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: After the war, the family sold the company to American
Speaker 2: Home Foods, but Hector continued to work for them as
Speaker 2: a consultant all the way until nineteen seventy eight. He
Speaker 2: died a millionaire in nineteen eighty five. And you know,
Speaker 2: not bad for an immigrant kid who just wanted to
Speaker 2: share his spaghetti.
Speaker 1: Oh, I love it. You know, I did not eat
Speaker 1: a lot of chefbardy as a kid, but I certainly
Speaker 1: lot the commercials. And I loved that this brought you
Speaker 1: back to him before that. I'm going to give you
Speaker 1: the trophy for today.
Speaker 2: You know, I just wish I could share it with Hector.
Speaker 2: He really did all the work. I'm just talking about it.
Speaker 1: Well, Hem and Dylan. So that does it for us today.
Speaker 1: If you enjoyed what you heard, be sure to subscribe,
Speaker 1: leave us a nice rating, and share the show with
Speaker 1: a friend, maybe even over a plate of pasta. Today's
Speaker 1: episode was researched and written by our goodpal Meredith Danko,
Speaker 1: whose favorite pasta shape is brotini. We will be back
Speaker 1: next week with another new episode, and in the meantime,
Speaker 1: from Will, Dylan, Gabe, Mary and myself. Thank you so.
Speaker 2: Much for listening.
Speaker 1: Part Time Genius is a production of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: At His host by my good pal Will Pearson, who
Speaker 1: I've known for almost three decades now. That is insane
Speaker 1: to me. I'm the Utaco host, Mangeshatikular aka Mango. Our
Speaker 1: producer is Mary Phillips Sandy. She's actually a super producer.
Speaker 1: I'm going to fix that in post. Our writer is
Speaker 1: Gabe Lucier, who I've also known for like a decade
Speaker 1: at this point, maybe more. Dylan Fagan is in the booth.
Speaker 1: He is always dressed up, always cheering us on, and
Speaker 1: always ready to hit record and then mix the show
Speaker 1: after he does a great job. I also want to
Speaker 1: shout out the executive producers from iHeart my good pals
Speaker 1: Katrina and Norvel and Ali Perry. We have social media
Speaker 1: support from Calypso Rallis. If you like our videos, that
Speaker 1: is all Calypso's handiwork for more podcasts from Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: Visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or tune in wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows. That's it from us
Speaker 1: here at part Time genius, Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: listening