By
Brian Hunsaker, posted June 8, 2009, at 3:00 pm
With father’s day rapidly approaching my thoughts are starting to turn towards the meal I will prepare for my father. After viewing Mr. Walken‘s preparing roasted chicken he mentioned this might be something he wanted. Of course this isn’t just any roasted chicken, it’s vertical roasted chicken. This of course requires, you guessed it, a vertical roaster. When it comes to vertical roasters there is only one name to go with and that’s Spanek. Read on to find out why.
The reason they are the go to guys for vertical roasters is simple, they invented it. Of course they didn’t invent vertical roasting, this was done by the Chinese several thousand years ago. What Spanek did was invent the iconic “Eiffel Tower” shaped vertical roaster that everyone thinks of. The vertical roaster as we know it was invented by George Spanek when his wife Anna, a Cordon Bleu chef who had lived in Paris for 30 years, grew dismayed over the inferior quality of produce and meat that was available to her in the US. She asked her husband to create a way to stand the bird up during cooking. This allows the inside to sear locking in the natural juices. Meanwhile all of this was being observed by a young Denis Spanek who was only 6 when his parents moved to the US from Paris.
After seeing how much work was involved in running his parent’s French restaurant, Denis instead went into real estate. He started to get a reputation for preparing vertically roasted chickens for new homeowners. Challenged by his father to try and successfully market the family’s vertical roaster, Denis was originally hesitant. Only after he started receiving more calls on the roaster, then he did on homes, did Denis take the vertical roaster business full time. That was in 1976, since 1979 Spanek has sold over 10 million vertical roasters and in 1981 was named on of the top ten most innovative products at the Paris Gourmet Show.
Given the response that the vertical roaster received Denis designed larger roasters to accommodate turkey, and smaller ones for game birds such as hen, pheasant and quail. He also developed a ring that can be fitted to the top of the roaster that holds 8 skewers for roasting chops, kabobs and other cuts of meat. Since they are vertically roasted they require no additional fat and produce a tender flavourful meat.
Available directly from Spanek you can get an entire set of roasters for turkey, chicken and game birds for just $44.95 in chrome and $54.95 in non-stick black. So why not make your father and Mr. Walken happy this father’s day and vertically roast a chicken?
Roasted chicken is going vertical
With father’s day rapidly approaching my thoughts are starting to turn towards the meal I will prepare for my father. After viewing Mr. Walken‘s preparing roasted chicken he mentioned this might be something he wanted. Of course this isn’t just any roasted chicken, it’s vertical roasted chicken. This of course requires, you guessed it, a vertical roaster. When it comes to vertical roasters there is only one name to go with and that’s Spanek. Read on to find out why.
The reason they are the go to guys for vertical roasters is simple, they invented it. Of course they didn’t invent vertical roasting, this was done by the Chinese several thousand years ago. What Spanek did was invent the iconic “Eiffel Tower” shaped vertical roaster that everyone thinks of. The vertical roaster as we know it was invented by George Spanek when his wife Anna, a Cordon Bleu chef who had lived in Paris for 30 years, grew dismayed over the inferior quality of produce and meat that was available to her in the US. She asked her husband to create a way to stand the bird up during cooking. This allows the inside to sear locking in the natural juices. Meanwhile all of this was being observed by a young Denis Spanek who was only 6 when his parents moved to the US from Paris.
After seeing how much work was involved in running his parent’s French restaurant, Denis instead went into real estate. He started to get a reputation for preparing vertically roasted chickens for new homeowners. Challenged by his father to try and successfully market the family’s vertical roaster, Denis was originally hesitant. Only after he started receiving more calls on the roaster, then he did on homes, did Denis take the vertical roaster business full time. That was in 1976, since 1979 Spanek has sold over 10 million vertical roasters and in 1981 was named on of the top ten most innovative products at the Paris Gourmet Show.
Given the response that the vertical roaster received Denis designed larger roasters to accommodate turkey, and smaller ones for game birds such as hen, pheasant and quail. He also developed a ring that can be fitted to the top of the roaster that holds 8 skewers for roasting chops, kabobs and other cuts of meat. Since they are vertically roasted they require no additional fat and produce a tender flavourful meat.
Available directly from Spanek you can get an entire set of roasters for turkey, chicken and game birds for just $44.95 in chrome and $54.95 in non-stick black. So why not make your father and Mr. Walken happy this father’s day and vertically roast a chicken?