Pots and pans

When I told my friend Edwin that the All-Clad factory was near Pittsburgh, and that they were having a dramatic sale on all their Seconds items the first weekend in June, he told me "we're going." He actually has a real job that pays quite well - paired with a passion for cooking and the finer things in life and it spelled out the possibility of a huge haul. He brought the pricing spreadsheets and know-how, I brought my car and another friend.

It was hilarious.


We got there a little bit before the fairgrounds were due to open and there was already a pretty huge line. Everyone was very pleasant, as you might expect; the folks in front of us bonded with my friend Amy over their hometowns and cracked jokes to keep us awake. As we waited, we saw people wheeling out dollies full of boxes that could only house very expensive cookware - high rollers, maybe budding restaurateurs. As we entered the warehouse we each were given a huge moving box with a twine loop around the handle so you could drag it behind you radio-flyer-style. We thought that was excessive, but then we saw the heaps of awesome cookware and Edwin's brain might have short-circuited. Boxes filled up to the brim. It was organized madness. People were shuffling through boxes, looking for the least-Seconds-like item, running to get matching lids from a different table, grabbing the cutest terrines $80 can buy (!) off stacks, woo hoo. Me, I was having the decision-sweats, faced with the prospect of buying a new pan and pot that would last a million years versus their price. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Amy and I got talked into our respective purchases, and I'm rather glad we did - I've never bought a more functional memento of an event.


(most of that is Edwin's!)

The boxes were too heavy to carry out to the car so we just dragged until the tape on the bottom damn near fell off. It was a very nice day, we were all playing hooky, had bought some really shiny and badass cookware, and life was good. Later Ed and I would go to Brgr for some burgers and their amazing vanilla salty caramel bourbon milkshake and life was even better. Peter and I also took Edwin to Salt of the Earth and Tamari (groupon!) that weekend, just for added mindblowing. We don't spoil ourselves like that almost ever, so it was great just to let loose and pretend we weren't grad students for a while.