Akito HirataFemale Bloggers disqualified from entering Chiko Roll ‘Search for a New Roll Model’ competition.
February 22nd 2008 05:26
90s Chiko Chick, model Sarah Jane (no last name needed due to fame), deploring the treatment of ‘chicks’ before going to a feminist rally.
In a sad day for Orble females, American company JR Simplott Co of Idaho (which now manufactures and processes that iconic Aussie ‘meal’ the Chicko Roll), has announced some startlingly prohibitive entry conditions in their quest to find the next Aussie Chiko Chick. One rule states, ‘You cannot enter if you are currently represented by a modelling agency,’ effectively disqualifying the majority of female Orble bloggers.
Due to numerous complaints from Christian lobby groups about the raunchy look of past Chiko poster girls (known as Chiko Chicks), such as Sarah Jane and Katrina Long, the new ‘face of Chiko’ will be a ‘girl next door’ type. Which begs the question, What is a ‘girl next door’ type?
According to Chiko marketing director Richard Laffy (who is obviously up-to-speed and in-the-loop with regards to the emancipation of the modern female), it’s a girl who appeals to Chiko’s target audience ‘hungry Aussie blokes looking for a gut filler’ … “It’s very much a case of out with the old and in with the new,” Dick said, speaking from his mouth. “The aim of the search is to find a girl who is quintessentially Australian – fun, cheeky, down to earth and above all, active.” (the last clause sadly ruling even more Orble female bloggers out).
It makes one wonder who Richard’s neighbours are.
Richard Laffy’s idea of modest girl(s) next door types, Lauren Heeney, Lexi Cottee and Natalie Brown (checking out the back of the Chicko Roll Van which is nothing like a Panel Van).
Now that you have at least read this far, it’s time to get into the body of the article, a look at the history of the Chiko Roll.
History of the Chiko Roll
Regardless of its appearance and taste, the Chiko Roll was not invented by a man who learned how to deep-fry vomit, or accidentally spewed into a deep-fryer at a fish-and-chip shop after a weekend on the turps. It was invented by a sober Francis Gerard McEnroe in one of his less salubrious moments. He was born in Castlemaine (Vic) in 1908, and died in 1979 (probably of long-term gastro-intestinal complications or alcoholism).
John McEnroe (no relation to Francis Gerard McEnroe) just before he was hospitalised for food-poisoning, after ordering 5 Chiko Rolls at the Australian open when he mistook a Chiko Chick for a Hot Dog Vendor.
Like all devout Catholics who use naked girls to advertise their businesses, Frank’s nuptials with his wife Anne were held in a Catholic Church, the Sacred Heart Cathedral in Bendigo, and their union was blessed by Bishop John McCarthy of fond memory. RIP. And may the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace. Amen.
After his secondary school education at a Marist Brothers’ College, Frank completed an apprenticeship as a boilermaker at Thompson’s foundry. Unfortunately, Frank took the secret of why such an education led to boilermaking to the grave. RIP Frank.
During the depression, Frank’s father and brothers set up a dairy farm and milk-processing and distribution business at Bendigo. Which is the logical conclusion of dairy farming. It was always going to be difficult to process and distribute anything other than milk while running a dairy farm. Other than beef. Or cow skin rugs.
From the late 30s, Frank ran an outdoor catering business, selling pies and pasties, and other assorted nutritional supplements at country shows, Aussie Rules football matches, and race meetings.
During WWII, he was the publican (licensee) of the Court House Hotel. While our soliders were off getting killed, Frank was serving schooners and pints. After the war, he continued processing food, packaging and snap-freezing the products at the family’s former dairy.
Ron Barassi feeding Malcolm Blight a Chinese chop-suey roll at Tigerland’s Punt Rd HQ during half-time of the 1970 Round 1 Richmond versus North Melbourne clash as part of the Chiko Roll’s Inspiration 20 year anniversary celebration, ‘Thank God for the Asians and Chop-Suey.’
In 1950, inspired by a Chinese chop-suey roll which he saw on sale outside the Richmond FC oval on Punt Road, Frank developed a similar product produced on a hand-operated sausage-making machine, and called it the Chiko Roll, after the ‘Slanty-Eyed, Slope-Food Turd Burger’ was rejected by the government department responsible for the naming of new products. Frank was extremely proud of the fact it was designed to be eaten with one hand while drinking a beer at the footy. How a chop-suey roll could inspire someone is beyond me, but that was Frank the publican who never went to war but served schooners and pints at the local pub. RIP Frank.
The ‘technicolour yawn’ type ingredients (which are put through a mincer, not shovelled up from the footpath outside a pub) are cabbage, barley, carrots, celery, condiments (the usual preservatives and colourings that give children ADD and ADHD) and the tiniest bit of mutton (the type of sheep’s-meat butchers only sell to senile old ladies with dementia and alzheimer’s who use it to make watery soup stock because they still think they’re living during the depression). This gluggy, coagulation of minced ‘foodstuffs’ is wrapped in an ‘egg-butter’ dough (probably made from the eggs of abused battery hens, and cheap margarine or lard). To prevent any living bits from escaping, the egg-butter ‘tube’ was deep-fried, frozen, then shipped to outlets where it was dunked in more boiling oil to heat it up and destroy any taste so as to make it digestible. It was generally wrapped in a thin, paper bag to increase the chances of burning your hands along with your tongue, gums, tonsils, and back of your throat.
The Chiko Roll proved a huge success in the 50s and 60s. Australian consumers gave the first indications they would welcome an American fast food invasion from KFC, McDonalds, Pizza Hut, Subway, and the likes.
A statue of Frank McEnroe (boilermaker) trying to flatten out the pastry on his first Chiko Roll.
The Chiko Roll was acclaimed as ‘the food of the future’ at the 1951 Wagga Wagga Show in NSW. It was the first year Betty Madge Dawson didn’t win the deep-frying blue ribbon event for her battered-butternut-pumpkin recipe. Betty died of a heart attack during the 51 Wagga Show. RIP Betty. And may the souls of all the faithful departed rest in peace …
Firmly entrenched on the road to Chiko financial success, Frank and his family moved to Melbourne, and began producing Chiko Rolls from the rear of a fish shop in Moreland Road, Coburg. Due to the product’s success, Frank moved into a more upmarket address - a factory at North Essendon, where he improved the facilities for packaging, freezing and distribution. In 1960, he merged his firm with a neighboring company, Floyds Ice Works, to form Frozen Food Industries Pty Ltd. It became a public company in 1963.
The Simplot Thickens.
Sadly, Frank’s family lost the business, but he had a Catholic burial. An even sadder yet little known fact is that no Chicko Chick attended his funeral, so a Catholic Priest had to read out the eulogy. Regardless of the sadness of the occasion, the congregation cheered and clapped wildly every time a Chiko Chick was mentioned. “It was a fitting celebration of his life,” the inconsolable priest who refused to be named, said.
Since 1995, the product has been owned by Simplot (Simplot Australia (Holdings) Pty Ltd, a subsidiary of its American parent company, The JR Simplot Company, which is owned by JR “Jack” Simplot, a notorious self-image promoter who has carefully designed his own image to be a cross between JR Ewing, Colonel Sanders, Robert Duval’s character in Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now and the writer of Full Metal Jacket. Sadly, Jack wasn’t present at the funeral either because he’d never heard of Frank. At the time, his chief interest was the marketing potential of the Chiko Roll based upon his knowledge of the value of mergers.
JR “Jack” Simplot
Simplot employ about 10,000 people in the US, Canada, Australia, China and Mexico. (The company refused to release details of any Mexican employee other than to say, none are involved in administration or at an executive level). Annual sales are about $3billion (give or take a few 0s for Jack’s hat and tie-pin collection).
Conclusion
To become the next Chiko Roll Chick, you must complete an entry form at ‘Search for the Next Chico Chick’ casting events, and hand it to a member of the Promoter’s staff on that day. (These locations are mainly surf lifesaving clubs on the eastern and southern coast of Australia).
Finalists have to attend the Rip Curl Pro Event at Torquay, Victoria, from 20-23 March 2008, where the winner will be announced on March 22.
For those of you bloggers with female friends who do not blog and therefore don’t have a modelling contract, full details of the competition for FW or forwarding purposes can be found at:
http://www.chikochick.tv/
Hail Hitler!
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