Top 5 Best Gas BBQ's

We are getting more and more questions about which BBQ’s are the best, gas or BBQ, which is a whole new post in its own right but I thought it was about time we reviewed our Top 5 Best Gas BBQ’s as the last one we did was 2009! Wow, how time flies.

As I frequently say, we are massive fans of charcoal BBQ’s but I can see why so many people favour gas BBQ’s. If you have a big family, use BBQ’s multiple times per week and need your food grilling fast, then BBQ’s are probably best for you and your family.

That being said, we have twins on the way and I don’t think this will make us switch to gas, but never say never!

Moving on, based on our experience and having had  a play with many gas BBQ’s, here are our Top 5 Best Gas BBQ’s for 2011.

1. Weber Q220 Black line Gas BBQ & Stand (Amazon £289.00)

One of the new 2011 range of Gas BBQ’s from Weber. Why does it get the number one spot, well, it has everything! The Q220 Black Line BBQ from Amazon has a huge 206 inch grill, cast iron lid and cooking grill and is possibly the nicest looking gas BBQ currently on the market. At £289.00 it is for the serious griller or those who want a BBQ that will last them for life. If you have a large family to grill for, this is the gas bbq for you.

2. Outback Omega 250 (Amazon £144.00)

A great entry level BBQ for gas fans but it is also built to last thanks to it carrying the well resepected Outback branding. The cooking area is 50×36 cm and it even has a side burner. A real bargain in the gas bbq world.

3. Australia 200 Series 3 Burner Roaster Gas BBQ (Amazon £249.99)

I picked this one for a couple of reasons. One, I had a go on an Australia Gas BBQ as part of a testing day and found it to be one of the easiest to get going (in terms of fiddling about) and secondly, it specifically has tools for roasting joints.

A 64 x 49 cm grill space is also a bonus as are the three burners.

4. BillyOh Gas BBQ Tasman 300 (Amazon £63.90)

A nice, affordable and cheap entry level gas BBQ from BillyOh. This gas BBQ does the job, has two burners and I picked it because it comes with the kit.

It comes with regulator and cover and as I say, is a nice affordable piece of kit.

5. Outback Excell 300 Gas BBQ (Amazon £149.99)

Another new season BBQ and this one is from Outback who make great gas BBQ’s. A 50 x 38 cm grill means that this is not the largest gas bbq on offer but in my eyes it is the prettiest.

Don’t be worried about the eye catching modern design though, it is still a very powerful gas bbq and will do brilliant for the average sized family.

6. Weber Summit S670 Gas Stainless Steel BBQ (Amazon £2849.99)

Ok, so this one was more of a giggle but… if you have won the lottery and have watched MTV Cribs, this is the Gas BBQ for you!

So, there you have it, our Top 5 Best Gas BBQ’s… And here they all are (below) in one easy to see widget (courtesy of Amazon).

Popularity: 19% [?]

BBQ Hints and Tips

Sometimes you have a BBQ that is for more than just a few family members. For example we regularly cater for 7+ people and this can bring a few logistical headaches that over the year we have found ways of dealing with.

So, here are our Top 5 Sneaky BBQ Tips and Tricks

1. Bag Everything up to Save Space in Your Fridge

One of the biggest problems with big BBQ’s is fitting everything in the fridge. One of the easiest ways around this is to bag all your prepped BBQ foods up using a food bag. This can include your salads, meat marinading, potato salad etc.

You can then just pop them in their serving dishes when the time comes. Saves the hassle of balancing bowls on bowls in your fridge.

2. Get a job lot of the Weber Silver Drips Trays

These trays are a god send! You can use them for their intended use of collecting the juices from your BBQ’d meat (prevent the coals catching alight again) or you can use them as a serving tray, or even have them on your grill to store cooked foods and keep it all hot. (Amazon £9.00)

3. BBQ Kettle/BBQ Chimney Starter

These are great for those longer BBQ Recipes that need the coals to be topped up. Just place your new charcoal in one of these, light it and then 20 mins later you can pour the coals onto your BBQ. (Amazon £18.00)

4. Oven Glove/BBQ Mitt

Brilliant for quickly moving grills about or when you need to move coals about using a poker or alike. They allow you to get a bit closer to the BBQ… But watch out for the Chuck Norris Shave, i.e. when you get to close to the BBQ and you can feel your weekend stubble burning (Amazon £9.75)

5. Buy Bags of Ice!

You will be amazed at how quickly you go through so much ice at a larger BBQ! Supermarkets sell bags of ice for just £1.00 nowadays and it takes away a common headache!

Popularity: 5% [?]

Weber Kettle BBQ

One of the great things about the early BBQ season is the fact that all the new BBQ equipment is out earlier than normal. As regular readers of this blog will know, we are big fans of Kettle BBQ’s so it is great to hear that Weber has a new range out for 2011.

The first is the 47 inch, One Touch Weber BBQ. We have found the cheapest price for this over on Amazon at just £83.55.

The second new Weber kettle BBQ is the One-Touch 57 inch, again with the cheapest price being on Amazon at just £119.99.

Why do we love Weber Kettle Grills so much? Simple(s)… they come with a 10 year warranty, are so simple to put together that even I can do it, have reinforced handles so if you do need to move it when it is hot you won’t burn your fingers, has a rust free vent… well basically, we love them.

I also think they are the most flexible BBQ out there. You can roast joints on them, do simple burgers and sausages quickly and even do pizza’s as you can get the temp nice and high.

The other great thing about Weber Kettle bbq’s are that they have a great range of accessories like the BBQ Wok that costs just 29.99, and even a chimney starter (£16.71) that helps you keep your BBQ hot when you are cooking roasts.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Best and cheapest Portable Gas BBQ's

Following on from the blog on portable charcoal BBQ’s that has become one of the most popular we have ever written we have been inundated with requests for the same topic, but for Gas powered BBQ’s.

Whatever my thoughts on Gas BBQ’s (not all bad – they are great for families, or those who need to BBQ on the quick) there is no doubt they are higely popular. Combine their ease of use with the fact there are now loads of portable Gas Barbecues out there and you have a winning combination.

Here are a selection of the best, all from Amazon because they have the best range available in the UK and they are one of the safest shops to buy from online.

It may look like an alian space craft but this Grill N Go Portable Gas BBQ at just £69.99 represents fantastic value for money.  As you would expect from a good gas BBQ it has temperature controls and some nifty controls. We particularly like the fact it has a light in the middle so even when the sun disappears you can keep on grilling.

We also love that the mucky parts can go in the dishwasher and its rather funky carry handles which mean you can move it even when it is on full blast.

A bit more expensive, but still looking rather dashing is this O-Grill Portable Gas BBQ that costs £144.99. It comes in either red, blue, green or red, but be warned, it is one of this years best sellers so get in quick if you want one.

The build quality is awesome and it has a chunky feeling cast iron grill and steel casing! Sounds heavy but is surprisingly light and more importantly, easy to clean plus it weighs just 11kg!

Moving on to the big-boys of the portable gas BBQ industry we had a look at the Weber Q Portable Gas barbecue that costs £201.99.

Yes it is the most expensive we have reviewed but by god it is amazing! It has a 280 sq inch (massive) cooking space, you can roast an entire flipping chicken on it and because of its unique design and the way in which is retains its heat, it can even be positioned on top of a wooden table without the risk of causing a fire!

We reckon you could get an amazing 15 burgers on this beast and still have room to hide a few sausages on there too! It is by far our favourite, but it does come at a slightly higher price.

Popularity: unranked [?]

Weber Sauces

I have been meaning to write this up for ages and have finally got chance today. Every now and again we get sent new BBQ related products that go down a storm with the iLoveMyBBQ.com team and Weber has possibly become our favourite BBQ sauce and marinade company with its new range of sauces.

We had three sauces sent through and decided to try them on censecutive weekends. As word spread around our friends about how nice the sauces were, by the time we reached the third weekend we were having to politely turn away requests to come and sample the new range and instead pointing out that they were available for just £2.09 (bargain o’clock!) from the likes of Waitrose, Tesco and The Asda.

The sauces we had were  (the official description from the lovely people sent them over is in italics),

Weber Original BBQ Sauce – “an authentic BBQ sauce with a light, zesty flavour, works perfectly as a a marinade for ribs and chops but also as a dip for sausage and kebabs too…”

The iLoveMyBBQ.com rating: 10/10! Possibly the nicest BBQ sauce we have ever tasted. It had the right level of tangy-ness, i.e. enough to be noticed but not to the extent that you pulled one of those faces that only your nearest and dearest should see which you get with some of the cheaper BBQ sauces.

Weber Hot’n'Spicy BBQ Sauce – “not for the faint hearted, this hot sauce has depth to its flavour and is the perfect accompaniment to spice up and BBQ dish. We recommend with barbecued fish and a crisp green salad…”

The iLoveMyBBQ.com rating 9/10! Only lost marks because I am a bit weak when it comes to hot food. Spookily, everyone commented about the fact that it was not just hot for the sake of being hot and was actually packed with flavour.

Weber BBQ Relish – “A hearty tomato based relish, enjoy with some crispy bacon, a slice of cheese, a fresh bun and a homemade burger!”

The iLoveMyBBQ.com rating 10/10! You know what, we listened to the description and jolly well did try it with a home made burger. The sauce was so nice no one mentioned my lovingly crafted home made burgers and just raved about how tasty the sauce was. I am now writing a sternly worded letter to Weber to see if they can tone down the quality of the relish.

Overall, I know it sounds bad to get so excited about what is essentially 3 bottles of sauce, but I really do think you should see for yourself how good they are. For me, they are the best BBQ sauces currently on the market, even better than the Cajun Paul Newman sauces we tried earlier in the season, AND… better than the Guinness marinade (sorry Guinness, I feel like I am cheating on you!).

Available from Tesco, Watirose and The Asda, for just £2.09.

Popularity: unranked [?]

Weber Kettle BBQ Montage!

One of the greatest things about the BBQ world is the fact that there are not hundreds of brands all jostling for position and you can more easily spot the companies to look out for. Weber is one of thegrand-daddies of the BBQ world and is probably the subject of 50% of all the emails I get, asking if their products are really worth spending the extra money.

The answer, in short, is yes!

We have always found Weber products to be the best that the BBQ world has to offer. We have had a few of their Barbecues, only ever changing as we needed bigger ones or they got damaged whislt moving.

We are now using a Weber kettle BBQ which was purchased a few years ago and will probably be replaced next year, but it is a fantastic bit of kit. The attention to detail is the first thing I noticed, as is the high level of build quality.

Anyway, given that Weber is one of the brands that iLoveMyBBQ.com fans seem most interested in I decided to pick out some of my favourite Weber Charcoal BBQ’s that are curently available.

There are two mainstream national online retailers for Weber Charcoal BBQ’s, these are Homebase and B&Q.

Homebase stocks two Weber Charcoal Barbecues. The first is the Weber One Touch Gold and Green Charcoal BBQ that costs £169.99 and can feed up to 8 people. It comes with a 10 year manufacturers guarantee and has a chrome plated grill. One of the things I like most about all of the Weber Kettle Charcoal grills is the fact they look a bit more egg shaped than the normal kettle grills and I always think this makes them stand out that little bit more.

The second Weber option from Homebase is the slightly more affordable Weber One-Touch Silver Kettle Charcoal Barbecue which costs £99.00. It is exactly the same size as the Gold and Green version, Dimensions: Height 98cm x width 64cm x depth 57cm and so the slightly lower price can only be down to the change in colour.

Once again the One-Touch Silver can cater for up to 8 people, has the 10 year guarantee and a chrome plated grill.

Weber Gold and Green Kettle BBQ

Browsing on over to B&Q and their website they appear to have the identical Weber BBQ’s but they carry a different name and more importantly, are significantly more affordable than Homebase.

The B&Q Weber equivilent product to the One-Touch Homebase range is called the Weber 57cm Bar B Kettle Charcoal Barbecue (catchy) and costs just £89.98. It comes with a slightly lesser warrantee (5 years) but apart from that looks exactly the same.

Its sister product, the Weber 47cm Bar B Kettle Charcoal Barbecue at £79.98 is identical apart from the fact its grill is 47cm in depth as opposed to the other B&Q offering which is 57cm in depth.

At the minute, as I say, these are the two most well known national stockists of Weber Charcoal Kettle BBQ products and if I was you, I would stick with B&Q!

Popularity: unranked [?]

Beer Can up the Bum Chicken

Some time ago we tried a recipe I had read loads about on American based BBQ websites called, “Beer can up the bum chicken”, ok, it sounds a little odd but it is actually really good fun, a great talking point for any big social occasion you are planning a BBQ for and best of all, tastes funking awesome!

You WILL need a Kettle Style BBQ for this.

All you will need for this is (based on catering for 6)

2 x medium sized chickens

1 xWeber Charcoal Chimney Starter

1 x Weber Large Drip Pan

Plenty of charcoal

2 x Cans of Lager (I think the stronger it is the more flavour it adds to the chicken – but we used Fosters)

4 x Tbsp of Cajun Rub (optional)

The Plan:

1. Light your charcoal and let it get itself to temperature

2. Rub the Cajun Rub over your chickens

3. Take a swig out of the cans of lager/beer. Just one swig from each mind, and no monster gulps either!

4. After making sure there is nothing in the carcass of th chicken, place the can into the hole (on both chickens)

Half way through cooking BBQ Beer Can up the Bum

5. Go back to your coals and if at the right temperature (white hot and glowing), push to edges of Kettle BBQ (see pictures to see how we did it).

6. In the middle of the BBQ (0n the same level as the coals, place your Weber drip trays to catch the fat and juices)

7. Place your grill above the coals as normal and then balance your chicken (with can up the bum) on the grill

8. Close the lid, cook for 2 hours for large chickens or a bit less for smaller ones. Your coals will cool after about an hour and you will need new ones so use the Chimney to prepare some new coals and then place in the Kettle BBQ after an hour of cooking.

9.  To check if the Can of Beer up the Bum Chickens are cooked, prod a knife into the thickest part of the chicken and it clear fluid comes out it is done.

10. Tuck in!

Why not let us know how you get on with your Beer Can up the Bum Chicken BBQ Recipe? Maybe had a great variation on this or did something to make it a bit different? let us know by leaving a comment (no need to register or any of that).

Starting point for Beer Can up Bum BBQ Recipe

Popularity: unranked [?]

Cheapest Weber BBQ Chimner Starter

You know that the BBQ season is fully upon us when the big outdoor and DIY retail stores start stocking their BBQ ranges and this weekend saw B&Q really go to town.

We stocked up on the instant lighting charcoal and it also gave me a chance to have a look at some of this seasons new BBQ gadgets and gizmo’s, unfortunately there was not that much new stuff on the market, yet!

First up I had a look around the range of BBQ’s (dodging the gas ones of course!), and this new B&Q Bondi Charcoal Barbecue with trolley looks incredibly slick and even has a hot plate which is very handy indeed. The Boni Charcoal Barbecue with trolley is quite cheap and sells for £149.98.

A quite swish looking Ottawa Kettle Charcoal BarBeCue also looks very neat and tidy and has a very handy side table, something that it missing from our own kettle BBQ at home. The Ottowa Kettle Barbecue is oval in shape and only costs £89.98. Quite an affordable option and now I am converted to kettle BBQ’s one product I may have a look at myself once the sales start.

Before I converted over to a kettle BBQ I always wanted a half barrel Barbecue and this Edmonton Half Barrel Charcoal Barbecue looks very impressive and has the segregated sections which is very handy if you are cooking for vegetarians or need a coller area to rest your meat (so to speak!). I could not believe a BBQ of this size was only £69.98 cheap as chips!

I was gutted to see that B&Q no longer stocks the Oz coals in store, these were my favourite, instead is has Penbeads which are very similar but not quite as hot as the Oz Heat Beads, still, at only £4.99 the Penbeads BBQ Briquettes are good value for money.

Bondi Trolley BBQ

One gadget that did catch my eye and which I used quite a lot  when we did the chicken up the bum recipe is the weber charcoal chimney starter. This essential piece of kit is great if you are having long and fun BBQ’s as you can keep topping up the charcoal without having to stop cooking.

The Weber Charcoal Chimney Starter costs on £15.98 (bargain!) and you light the top up charcoal in it and then when they have reached the right cooking temperature (white) then you pour it onto your existing BBQ! Genius!

As and when we spot more BBQ gadgets and gizmo’s, or better still, cheap BBQ accessories we will keep you posted.

For now though, go and start your griddles, it is now Summer after all!

Popularity: unranked [?]