Well, sort of. It’s now called EcoQue, which may be a horrible name, but at least hits its prime audience right on target.
Okay, okay, what’s a Pyromid? Or an EcoQue? (I hear some readers asking.)
It’s this, among other things:
… The cleverest, best-cooking portable grill ever. And for a decade or more it’s been half-impossible to get.
—–
Back in the 1990s at some otherwise-unremembered preparedness expo, my then-Significant Sweetie, Charles Curley, and I saw a Pyromid being demonstrated. It folded down flat and slipped into a tiny case. It unfolded in a flash. It cooked on an open grill; flip the lid and it smoked your steak or chops nicely. It was so sleek, so slender, so clever, so economical to use (requiring just nine bricks of charcoal to cook a nice little meal).
And it was so expensive!
Nevertheless, we left the expo with one and later bought attachments like a griddle and a baking hood.
Initially I feared it might be one of those gimmick items that never even gets taken out of the box. But nope. We cooked on the Pyromid during bbq season. We cooked on the Pyromid in the snow. When Charles and I ultimately broke up, we joked that the only thing we fought over was who’d get custody of the Pyromid. (For the record: He did.)
And right about that time, the Oregon company that made the thing drove its wonderful product right into the Dumpster. The product remained great. The marketing was daft. Instead of pushing Pyromids to yuppie backpackers and gear-crazed survivalists, suddenly the grills were being promoted as … um, a solution to third-world disaster relief or something like that. (As if any third-worlders would have needed, or been able to afford, this shiny bit of yup-ware.)
Anyhow, next thing I knew, and for several years thereafter, Pyromid’s website contained little besides hopeful statements that they expected to be “back in production later this year.”
But for a long time, if you wanted one — and I did — you had to get them used on eBay.
But tonight Charles (still speaking after all these years) sent me a link to EcoQue with the message, “It’s back!”
No idea how long it’s been in production again; only that this time it’s coming out of Seattle and has a new name. Prices haven’t gone up one bit since the 1990s and may even be down a little. Now if they’ll only add the baking hood back into the product line, my life will be complete.
I have no financial interest in EcoQue or its grills at all. (That is, unless you happen to buy one through this Amazon link to their products or any of my other Amazon links.) I just think it’s one of the best-designed, most compactable, hardy, and have I already mentioned best-cooking little stoves in the universe. A great thing for campers. A fine thing to add to home survival stocks. An EcoQue and a single bag of charcoal could go a long, long way toward keeping hot food on the table if the power goes out.
Welcome back, Pyromid — no matter what name you choose to be known under.
The grill is expensive, but a very nice acquisition in the future.
And I do like that pizza oven-smoker! Applewood-smoked bacon, here I come…
Ow that is expensive. However, not out of line with similar cookers such as the one marketed by A.G. Russell.
I’ve bought quite a few charcoal grill things. I like the taste of mean cooked on them. I HATE cleaning them, however… sigh And the smaller ones get really greasy and dirty fast. So, I inevitably wind up giving them away. (I’ve even abandoned a few in various moves.)
I’ll wait until they bring out one that is self cleaning. 🙂
MamaLiberty — Yeah, point taken. They are a bitch to clean, and the smaller the bitchier. But oh man, does a Pyromid cook well — and quickly — and I love that it just folds inconspicuously away.
Also, about the only part of the Pyromid/EcoQue ever needs scrubbing is the grill plate itself. The base is lined with foil that you can just toss after every five or six uses. The ash falls neatly through holes in that and can just be dumped when cool.
I like this EcoQue thingy. Thinking about getting one. I do have reservations about how easy those holes will be to clean, scraping the stuff off a regular grill is hard enough. It has gotten easier since we stopped grilling flaming chicken though… and switched to the Primal Diet, much easier. However; this looks like a Great SHTF item, using only nine briquettes speaks volumes, to me at least.
I wonder what you’re talking about with the foil liner. I mean, what’s the purpose? I have yet to clean the bottom of my regular grill, I suppose it’s normal for People to do so yearly, but I don’t see why. Is it because it’s easier/cleaner to pack and transport that way?
One other thought, I had caught a bit from ole Martha Stewart once, she didn’t have good things to say about cooking with aluminum foil so I’ve been avoiding it as much as I can. After all, it IS from Alcoa – warmonger central, and aren’t they the source of a lot of the fluoride put in the water? I wonder about them, and those like them, and the products they produce.
I’ve looked a couple of times on your webpage for an Amazon link and I don’t see it, where exactly is it? Prolly a snake in the grass right in front of my eyes >>>
clark — It’s a great SHTF item, indeed. The foil liner does exactly what you say; you can toss it (along with all the grease and gunk on it), then pack the cooker away flat and neat. I share some of your concerns about aluminum foil; one good thing is that the aluminum never comes in contact with the food. That’s a plus. I suppose if you were to leave the grill set up all the time you could do without the foil. Not sure; never tried it.
You don’t have to buy their liners, though. I make my own out of heavy-duty foil using one of theirs as a model.
Another plus is that the grill is relatively easy to clean. The little holes do fill up after a couple of uses, but just scrub with a wire brush and/or run a small knife around each hole and it’s done. I’m not saying it’s a tidy or a fun process. But it doesn’t take a long time.
Thanks for thinking about using my Amazon link! Yep … snake that’s close enough to bite. The very top post on the blog is stickied and contains my “generic” Amazon link. There’s a specific Amazon EcoQue link in this post. Either will work. Any time anybody enters Amazon through one of my coded links, everything they buy during that visit is credited to me (and while I see what’s purchased, I never see who bought it).
For cleaning a grill: after removing the food, fire up the grill again. If it’s adjustable, set it so the grate is as close as possible to the heat sourse, and burn the crud to ashes.
(Yes, I’m lazy sometimes)
How well does that Ecoque do with wood instead of charcoal? I’m sure the sticks would need to be short, but would there be any other issues using wood instead?
Ellendra — Thanks for the grill-cleaning tip. Labor-saving. I like that. 🙂
And as far as I know, the Pyromid/EcoQue can burn a lot of different types of fuel without problems. I haven’t tried it, and I don’t know whether the EcoQue has any functional differences from the Pyromid, but I recall the versatility with fuel sources was one of the draws.
My Pyromid has a slotted metal plate that sits below the grill and is designed to hold exactly nine bricks of charcoal standing on end. But there’s no reason you couldn’t put something else on that plate. Or perhaps remove it altogether.