Technology in the garden - Big Green Egg

Roast chicken in the garden, anyone?

If lockdown inspired you to cook al fresco, but you’d like to do more than grill a sausage, it might be worth investing in this iconic outdoor oven.

So, what’s all the fuss about? For a start, unlike many conventional barbecues, it looks good, with its compact rounded shape and dimpled dark green exterior.  It works will on a free-standing base or base unit with a work top.  Or it can be integrated into an all -singing outdoor kitchen with worktops and shelving for pots of herbs.

The oven is made of top quality ceramic, which together with the heavy lid, with solid wood handle, locks in more heat and moisture than regular charcoal grills.  It can be used for sizzling chicken and burgers with the lid open or you can close the lid and control the temperature (there’s a built-in thermometer on the lid) with the vents and the chimney draught.  The stored heat holds steady for long periods of time letting you cook everything from bread and cakes, roast chicken, pulled pork or even smoking fish and meat.  Thin crust pizzas can be cooked on the pizza stone which also protects slow smoked meats from drying out.

The Egg comes in different sizes, such as the ‘Minimax’, and the ‘Large’ version.  Like all new ovens and barbecues, it takes some getting used to, but once you’ve learnt to regulate the temperature, you could become one of the many Big Green Egg’s devoted fans, along with the likes of Meghan Markle and the Beckhams!  And if the price point is too much, other companies such as Weber, Pig Bluey and Kamado Joe now make their own, often more competitively priced kamado grills.