Tales from everybody's backyard barbecue

CHICAGO TRIBUNE
HOT MAMA
For Brian McCutcheon, a Philadelphia sculptor, nothing but a Weber would do for a piece called "Trailer Queen."
The work, shown at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago last year, features a Weber decked out with chrome tail pipes, carburetors and white and gold flame detailing. (A "trailer queen" is slang for a car that's displayed but not driven; this is a grill not used for grilling.)
For McCutcheon, who says he was "toying with hot-rod imagery along with the masculine in American iconography," the Weber kettle was an obvious choice. He says of all his works on display in Chicago, "Trailer Queen" garnered the "most instantaneous recognition" from visitors.
JUST PART OF THE JOB
Janet Olsen of Palatine, Ill., has heard more than her share of Weber stories but that's her job. She works at Weber's customer service center, which functions 24 hours a day, seven days a week in a Schaumburg office park.
Olsen's knowledge of Weber and its products is almost encyclopedic after seven years on the job. Give her the first few letters of a serial number and she'll gently interrupt with the model name. Olsen even can determine from a very sketchy description that Mike from Houston thinks he has a Genesis I gas grill but really owns a Genesis II. She firmly advises an Illinois caller hankering for a blackened steak to leave more fat on the meat rather than tinker with his gas grill's air-flow. Uneven heating could result, she warns.
John from Holbrook, Mass., calls for parts but asks about the "little cookbooks." She promises to put him on the mailing list for the company's "Grill Out Times," a twice-yearly periodical sent to customers.
Olsen and her fellow service reps do more than take orders for parts and troubleshoot balky grills. They also staff Weber's Grill Line, (800) 474-5568, a one-season service that became a year-round, 24-hour operation in April.
Pam Key, Weber's customer service manager, says that offering the grill hot line all year makes sense.
"After all, we're advocating grilling year-round," she says. Industry figures say 53 percent of grillers in the United States do just that.
Yet, nearly 50 years after the phrase "indirect grilling" entered the American lexicon, Key said Weber's call-center staffers spend a lot of time defining it.
"It's the biggest question," she says. (Indirect cooking means the food isn't grilled directly over the coals. Coals are pushed to the sides, creating more gentle heat.)
Key said that the hot line is starting to get more questions about cooking seafood on the grill. At least once or twice a summer, someone will call in about grilling a whole pig.
Mondays are the busiest days, Key said. Some people are reliving the problems of the past weekend, others are looking forward to the weekend ahead. The quietest time is the midnight shift, but that's when staffers tackle Weber's e-mail.
A GRILL'S LIFE
1952 -- George Stephen Sr. begins selling "George's Barbecue Kettle" for $29.95. Stephen, a resident of Mount Prospect, Ill., had developed the grill a year before. An employee of Weber Brothers Metal Works in Chicago, and a frustrated griller, he saw the metal buoy he was working on had potential beyond being just a flotation device. He drilled some vent holes in the top, added supports for cooking grates and built a three-legged frame to hold the contraption.
1958 -- By the time "The Westerner" grill had come along, Stephen's line of barbecue kettles had become so popular he was able to buy Weber Brothers, creating the Weber-Stephen Products Co. Although Stephen died in 1993, the company remains family-owned today.
1966 -- Although most popular in basic black, the Weber kettle grill found itself dressed up in all sorts of ways over the years. The "Wishing Well" model was introduced in 1966. Other styles sunk Weber grills into wrought-iron patio furniture, a barrel-shaped bar and a wooden cart. One grill was even outfitted with wheelbarrow-like handles.
1985 -- Weber introduces its Genesis line of gas grills, replacing a kettle-shaped, gas-fueled kettle grill introduced in 1971. The squarish Genesis models aren't as eye-catching but the shape works for consumers. Genesis grills have become Weber's most popular line.
2003 -- Enter the Q, Weber's line of portable grills small in size but with plenty of cool. Designed for a younger generation of consumers, the Q's curved lines harken to the classic Weber kettle while still managing to look space-age modern.