Skewer for the Masses
You don’t realize how old fashioned you really are until you search to buy something you haven’t bought in a while. When you arrive at the store, you find that nothing is how you remembered it, and confusion reigns supreme.
In the world of televisions and computers, you expect rampant advancement, but in other fields, you might assume that thousands of years of success with a product design would last a few more years. But that would be foolish of you to assume, because why would you buy new products if it weren’t for new features, even if said features were completely useless?
Today I searched for grill skewers, of the metal variety. I was hoping for a 12-18” long piece of thin metal, with a pointy end. A loop on one end and a few twists in the metal for easy gripping were features that I would have appreciated, but didn’t require.
However, after checking no fewer than eight stores, all of which claiming to have a ‘BBQ’ department, I was only barely successful in my search. The stores ranged from low end department stores to home stores to import shops to kitchen supply stores, and quite a number of things in between.
It isn’t that no one had skewers. Oh, they had skewers. Some were long elegant curves, meant to fit on special plates sold for the purpose. Others had huge handles with rotating finger knobs for easy turning. One was a skewer basket with a long thin basket attachment that would probably be very handy for cooking krill. If size was important, there were mighty 5 pronged skewers that looked more like the devil’s backscratcher than a cooking implement. Others still were equipped with spring-loaded attachments that served to ‘launch’ the food off the skewer upon completion of cooking, an attractive idea that would probably result in more airborne mushrooms than anything else. They came in all sorts of exotic materials and finishes, and some included their own carrying case. They were all quite expensive.
In a basket by the floor one could also find the traditional, but useless, bamboo skewers.
What was not to be found was a simple metal skewer that didn’t include some ridiculous feature! I had no idea that in the span of a few years we had completely reinvented the skewer. I was unaware of just how much I lacked by not being on the cutting edge of the skewer.
On a broader note, I think things like this are a sign of our countries disappearing middle class. When you buy a skewer, you show your class, everyone who sees you walk from the store now knows to which group you belong. Will you timidly pay cash and slink from the store clutching your little sack of pathetic bamboo skewers? Or do you proudly pay with your Titanium Credit Card, and march to your automobile brandishing your new Stainless Steel Bolt-Action Spring Loaded Ergo-Grip Skewers?
There is no room for the humble working man, who desires a simple but durable skewer for preparing his family’s hearty meals over their charcoal grill? Why must we relegate our citizens to pitiful bamboo skewers, clearly meant to be used over a coffee can full of burning animal feces, or glittering titanium skewers to be used over a Grill-Master 3000 grilling station? Is there no middle ground? Why all the extremes?!?
Anyway, in the end I finally found my skewers, but I had to look a lot harder than any reasonable person should have to look for skewers. Life is hard for the proletariat.
Thursday 02 Jun 2005 | Sam | Waxing Philosophical
“There is no room for the humble working man, who desires a simple but durable skewer for preparing his family’s hearty meals over their charcoal grill? Why must we relegate our citizens to pitiful bamboo skewers, clearly meant to be used over a coffee can full of burning animal feces, or glittering titanium skewers to be used over a Grill-Master 3000 grilling station? Is there no middle ground? Why all the extremes?!?”
Perhaps it is a problem of planned obselesence? the functional lifespan of a simple length of stainless steel with a loop on the end.. can be measured in decades. Perhaps the problem in the skewer market was.. that no one was buying them. The marketing departments mistook this “lack of sales” for a “lack of interest” and set about re-designing “easier” and “cooler” skewers.. when the real reason for the drop in sales might just have been that they had successfully supplied the needs of the skewering consumer base years ago.
I mean, if my mother’s skewers will work for me, and her mother’s for her.. why would we need new ones? Bent skewers can simply be unbent. It is only the lost or broken ones that need replacing.
So, the market designs a “cool skewer” with handles that will burn, and spring actiions that will fail in time. So a purchase today will likely result in another purchase a few years down the line.
Or.. perhaps you should just hit a thrift store and buy some used “classic” skewers…
or, look at This Auction on eBay?
Hey Sam, you should try the following:
Lelu Metalcraft & Patio Shop Inc
(314) 966-6195
13200 Manchester Rd
Saint Louis, MO 63131
If anyone is going to have them, they will…if you go, let me know what you find.
Son,
I must rise to the defense of the humble, recyclable, cool-to-the-touch, and all-natural bamboo skewer.
As you no doubt recall from your recent childhood here in Colorado, I often BBQ’d skewers of meat and veggies on bamboo sticks. They do require a brief soaking prior to use to prevent being consumed by the flames, but they serve quite well.
I have found that metal skewers don’t “grab” the food stuffs as firmly as natural woody-grass materials, so with metal the food rotates in situ on the grill instead of turning over with the skewer—- very frustrating!
Metal is likewise always HOT, even after a minute or two off the flame, while bamboo, as a naturally low-density material sheds what little heat it absorbs within seconds—a delight to tiny fingers.
I will grant one advantage to metal—- on occasion I have been pierced by a bamboo splinter from the skewer, a painful experience with a lot of torturous over tones.
Nevertheless, I’m a committed fan of bamboo and just thought I should speak up in defense of this humble material.
Yours for grilled food,
Dad
I happen to agree with your father sam, but also when looking for anything….let me know…I have lots of silly stuff living in my house(no..I didn’t get a new girlfriend). A skewer set was just donated to me a few weeks ago…along with a rotisserie(b/c ya never know when you’ll come across a large carcass)
hope things are going well with you guys
Spare us the suspense – where did you find the common man’s skewer?
This writeup is nothing but a tease!