Three decades in the wiener’s circle

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This article was published 18/06/2022 (1601 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Still smokin’ after all these years, Darren Yewchyn has something special up his white, paper hotdog sleeve to mark the 30th anniversary of Smoke’n Bob’s, one of the longest-running and most recognizable street-food vendors in Winnipeg.

Later this summer, Yewchyn, who succeeded his uncle (Smoke’n) Bob Yewchyn as owner in 2009, will begin marketing his own barbecue sauce, the same flavouring he’s been slathering on smokies, burgers and footlongs for a little over three decades. Standing next to his decked-out cart at the northwest corner of Portage and Notre Dame, he says he always believed his tomato-based concoction was top notch. It wasn’t long before customers started requesting sauce to go, however, that he made the decision to take things a step further.

“People would show up with empty ice cream pails, asking me to fill ’em up and name my price,” he continues, dressed in his usual attire: a bright yellow T-shirt, shorts and ketchup-red, Smoke’n Bob’s apron. “They’d tell me they throw it on everything, bacon and eggs, potatoes, steak … So yeah, after all this time, it’s kind of exciting to be starting a new chapter for Smoke’n Bob’s.”

Yewchyn, 56, has been hearing it a lot lately; how it’s somebody’s first visit to a hotdog cart since the onset of you know what. The married father of two feels their pang. Although the city’s downtown was largely deserted the last two summers, he continued showing up like clockwork, Monday to Friday, April through October, to serve however many customers happened by.

“I’m not going to lie, it was a real struggle, but we did what we had to do to keep things afloat,” he says, setting out a container of relish. “Even though there were days we sold barely anything, I felt it was important to keep our name out there, so people going by knew Smoke’n Bob’s was still around… that we hadn’t thrown in the towel or anything like that.”

Interestingly, it’s highly unlikely Yewchyn would have spent more than half his life dishing out tube steaks, if it hadn’t been for an injury he suffered 33 years ago, when he was a receiver for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.

A standout football player at River East Collegiate, Yewchyn joined the Bombers in 1987, following a two-year stint at College of the Siskiyous, in Weed, Calif. He dressed for 14 games during the 1988 season, which culminated with the team winning the Grey Cup. He was just coming into his own as a regular starter the following year, when he was seriously hurt.

“We were playing Toronto — I caught a pass over the middle and was trying to escape a tackle when this guy, Bruce Holmes, came out of nowhere and blasted me,” Yewchyn says, wincing at the memory. Not realizing his collarbone was broken, he shook the trainers off and remained on the field. He caught another ball on the next play, a 12-yard out, but when an Argos defender forcibly shoved him out of bounds, that was it — his playing days were kaput, owing to severe nerve damage on the left side of his body.

A month before that set of circumstances, Yewchyn was strolling along Portage Avenue when he stopped for a bite at a mobile hotdog cart. He found a place to sit and spent the next half hour watching the person manning the cart seemingly having the time of his life, kibitzing with customers and flipping franks. “What an interesting business,” he thought. He could definitely picture himself doing something similar when he hung up his cleats for good. Little did he know that day would soon be upon him.

“That winter, once I started feeling a bit better, I found a guy in the city who built stainless-steel carts, and asked him to set me up,” he says, adding because his dad had owned and operated a series of A&W franchises, he felt comfortable with the food industry.

 

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Yewch’s Dogs made its debut on Portage Avenue, directly in front of the Air Canada Building, in the spring of 1990. Two years later, Yewchyn convinced his uncle Bob to lend him a hand, after the elder Yewchyn was downsized out of a job at age 45. Bob Yewchyn took to the work immediately. He definitely had the gift of the gab, his nephew points out, and in July 1992, he founded Smoke’n Bob’s a few blocks away, in the shadow of what is now 201 Portage, the 33-story tower he worked in before hitting the unemployment line.

Sure, Darren could have continued operating as Yewch’s Dogs after Bob called it a day 13 years ago. Thing was, he fell in love with the name Smoke’n Bob’s the second his uncle came up with it, so he kept the brand in the family by buying the business — grates, tongs and all — from Bob, and selling his own operation to a close friend.

It was an easy enough transition. Besides sharing a commissary, the two had often joined forces through the years, being booked side-by-side for school events and private functions. They’d also spent many an evening bouncing menu ideas off one another, in an effort to stay two steps ahead of the competition.

He knows regular customers both by name and by order. Lots of times he’ll spot a certain person five-deep in line, and toss a bison or jalopeno-cheddar smokie on the grill, recognizing that’s precisely what will be requested in 30 seconds time. Also, you won’t spot it on the signboard, but don’t be shy about asking for a smurger; that’s a smokie topped with a burger, delivered on a kaiser-style bun with all the fixings.

One afternoon, Yewchyn prepared just that for himself, as a way of using up what was left over at the end of a long shift. Just as he was about to take a bite, a passerby shouted, “I’ll have what you’re having!”

Claiming there’s no such thing as a bad day at the office in his line of work (Too hot? Dip your cap in the ice water cooling the drinks. Too chilly? Stand a little closer to the flame. Stomach growling? There’s room for 100 pieces of meat on the grill.), Yewchyn figures he has another five years in him, at least, to cater to the masses.

No worries if you work downtown and that timeline doesn’t match your retirement plans; his 19-year-old son Brock, who began helping out when he was barely tall enough to see above the condiment rack, is ready, willing and able to become the third-generation owner of Smoke’n Bob’s.

“He runs his own cart in front of the Canadian Tire on Regent five days a week,” Yewchyn says, noting he often joins Brock there on weekends if his services aren’t required at a charity event, softball tournament or — careful with that mustard in your white dress — wedding.

Finally, yes, he hears it all the time: how it must be so great having his winters off. What people fail to understand, he says, is that if you tally up all the days and hours he puts in between April and October (he’s usually in the commissary by 7 a.m., seven days a week, and generally doesn’t arrive home before seven or eight at night), it’s the equivalent of working 40 hours a week, 12 months of the year. Oh, and no coffee breaks.

There’s an awful lot of work involved, if you want to be successful, he says. He agrees it’s nice he doesn’t have to think about hotdogs for five months when he’s done, but guess what? He still does.

“It sounds crazy but I’ll be driving around and stop to grab a dog at some random place. Sometimes they recognize me and ask what I’m doing there, and I’ll say, ‘Hey, I like a good hotdog as much as the next guy.’”

david.sanderson@freepress.mb.ca