YAKITORI GRILL
Get cookin’ with this Japanese-style
skewer grill.
By Bob Knetzger
One of the most memorable and delicious aspects of travel is
sampling the local foods. A trip to Japan gave me a chance to enjoy
favorites like takoyaki (octopus fritters), okonomiyaki (cabbage
frittatas), and other Asian eats in their native setting. A new (to
me) treat was yakitori, a simple bar food snack of grilled chicken.
In the Tokyo neighborhood of Shinjuku,
I saw (and smelled) enticing restaurants
featuring sizzling street-side grills. Unlike
big American grills that cook anything from
burgers to ribs to steaks, these specially sized
grills were designed to do one thing and one
thing only: skewers. Short skewers loaded
with chicken, asparagus, meatballs, and
other simple ingredients spanned the narrow troughs of red-hot coals. The suspended
foods cooked quickly and without burning
or sticking to a grate or grill surface. And the
offerings included nearly all the parts of the
chicken, from succulent breast (torinku) to
crunchy cartilage (nankotsu) and delicate,
crispy chicken skin (torikawa). Yum!
Back home, I wanted a way to cook yakitori
myself, so I came up with this easy-to-make
grill design and some specially designed roll-proof, double-crook skewers. Use them to try
delicious yakitori recipes.
Bob Knetzger ( neotoybob@yahoo.com) is an inventor/
designer with 30 years experience making fun stuff. He’s
created educational software, video and board games, and all
kinds of toys from high tech electronics down to “free inside!”
cereal box premiums.
SET UP: p. 111
MAKE IT: p. 112
USE IT: p. 116
Gregory Hayes
108 Make: makezine.com/30
