St. Patrick’s Day Cheese Spreaders

St. Patrick’s Day is one of my very most favorite holidays: It comes at the beginning of spring (and in fact is almost synonymous in my mind with celebrating the greening up of grass and the end of winter); it often falls during the spring break vacation of universities (I live in a college town and myself enjoyed drinking green beer for spring break during my college days); I’m Irish by ancestry; and my family and I always have a celebration involving corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, Irish whiskey and good Irish cheddar. For the cheddar, I usually set out St. Patrick’s Day-themed cheese spreaders.

However, these are harder to find than you might think. Unlike Christmas and Halloween (the most common holiday-themed spreaders), or even Easter or Thanksgiving (which have a fair number), St. Patrick’s Day spreaders are quite uncommon. I have had a followed/emailed search on Ebay for St. Patrick’s Day cheese spreaders for several years now and only rarely am I notified of them. I have managed to collect two sets, and have found photos of only a few others:

Here are three spreaders that were included in a lot of about 50 that I found on Ebay. I suspect that they were originally a set of four, but since I’ve never seen these elsewhere online, I have no way of knowing for sure. There is no manufacturer name, only “Stainless Steel, Made in China” on the blade reverse.

I had to take these out of the box to display them to their best advantage. There is a leprechaun on his pot of gold, an Irish harp, a pipe with a leprechaun’s head, and St. Patrick himself. These are made by Christopher Radko, who makes some very nice holiday-themed spreaders (mostly Christmas ones).

Ceramic spreaders that are pretty hard to find.

These were for sale on Ebay the other day, but since they aren’t technically figural spreaders, depicting things or people, I let the other bidders fight it out.

Pretty Plain Jane, all four the same.

I somehow missed these on Ebay earlier this year, to my great disappointment, as they’re pretty amusing, differently decorated pairs of jig-dancing legs. They were manufactured for Ganz.

I’ll keep my eyes peeled for more St. Patrick’s Day spreaders — perhaps by next year, I will have found a few more. Enjoy today’s festivities: drink some green beer, eat some corned beef, and Erin Go Bragh!