I've seen a lot of people complaining about Gale's need for items, but it strikes me that of all of the items that you can feed him, they are an eclectic collection - varied enough that you will almost certainly have at least one or two that you aren't going to use or don't have a need for.... in fact they seem picked out specifically so that his need will not, in reality, be any kind of real burden.
In my most recent games I've not had anyone in the party using two-handers, so naturally the sword was an easy choice to give him, for example, and it cost me nothing.
