Meaning:
Scraping the barrel is using or accepting something of inferior quality
because all the better quality items have been used up. The phrase initially
meant `use every last part of the barrel's contents so as not to waste any'.
A modern day variant of `scraping the barrel' is `jumping the shark` - used
when a long-running TV series is deemed to have put out a feeble episode,
having run out of better ideas.
Background:
Following a decline in usage in the late 20th century the expression
`scraping the barrel' has become popular again. This is no doubt because of
the reviews of the numerous reality TV shows, which are ploughing thinner and
thinner ground. Here in the UK no new show seems to get airtime unless it is
`The Great British...'. We were recently treated to The Great British
Celebrity Bake-off Christmas Special - and if that's not scraping the bottom
of the barrel I don't know what is. Perhaps Alan Partridge's spoof `Monkey
Tennis' idea might actually get made.
So, how about the origin of this phrase. The barrel being referred to is a
storage barrel and the scraping is the removal of the last dregs of the
contents. The first uses of the expression refer to scraping the barrel as a
means of getting the every last small piece, so as not to waste any.
Which specific product was first said to be the one that initiated the
`scrape the barrel' phrase isn't known. To explain that we need to go back in
time, to a date when barrels were commonly used for storage. As it turns out
we don't need to go as far back as you might think. Put thoughts of casks of
flour stored on medieval sailing ships out of your mind - the phrase
originated in the USA in the mid 20th century.
Presumably, barrels have always been scraped to remove the last remnants of
whatever they contained. The metaphorical usage, that is, one where no actual
barrel was involved, began in the 1930s. There were many forms of the phrase,
some referring to `scraping the ... barrel', some to `scraping the bottom of
the ... barrel'.
...
- www.phrases.org.uk [edited]
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Old friends, Bill and I share meals regularly. Unlike me, he does not seem to
have a Chinese stomach and with me, he does not need to worry about face. I get
to taste the simple foreign dishes he serves, with ingredients and spices of
wierd names, and we prefer eating at home where we can quaff our native ErGuoTou.
Growing up in the harsh 60s and 70s on the North China Plain, the guy is an
incorrigible barrel-scraper and proud of it. After many years since our humble
beginning, one of our childhood favorites, tomatoes stir-fried with scrambled
eggs, however, stays a favorite. He would use heirloom but never remove the
skin, as chefs do to improve the dish's texture, and literally scrape, with an
index finger, the inner surface of the shells for the last drop of liquid
protein after breaking an egg.
