HOW 25 YEARS OF THE FOREMAN GEORGE GRILL CHANGED HOW COOK MEN
In case you missed it, this is what the world’s most successful infomercial looks like: George Foreman – buff, bald and swaggering – sports a maroon boxing robe as he strides into the made-for-TV kitchen of his exceptionally cheerful cohost, a woman named Nancy Nelson. It is 1996, and her mind is about to be blown.
“You did not come here today to box, right?” Nelson asks Foreman.
“Not at all,” he says, before tossing off the robe to reveal that he’s wearing a red apron beneath it. “As a matter of fact – da-da-dada!” (Yes, Big George made his own transformational sound effect. And it worked.)
Over the next 30 minutes, the semiofficial-sounding “George Foreman Grilling Show” introduces the concept of a cheap electric grill with slanted vertical ridges and a press-down lid: George Foreman’s Lean Mean Fat-Reducing Grilling Machine. Plug it in and it gets hot quickly. Toss on some meat, lower the lid, place the tiny grease tray in front, and—voilà! In minutes, your food emerges grease-free and evenly cooked (often well-done, to be exact).
Foreman hams it up, making clear that his target
