Everything You Need for an Outdoor Kitchen
One of the best things about summer is getting out of the stuffy kitchen and dining outdoors! Just fire up the grill and throw on some burgers and pop a cold one, right?
On "The Early Show," Matt Blashaw, host of the DIY network's "Money Hunters," shared some great ideas and products to take your outdoor cooking and dining experience to the next level -- without a lot of work and without much money.
Blashaw says the challenge of grilling outdoors is to gather up all the items you need to create a simple kitchen and move all that stuff outside.
"So unless you have a built-in outdoor kitchen, you're going portable," he said. "And if you can put everything on wheels, that's even better."
Blashaw went portable first with the outdoor grill.
"You can spend a little or a whole lot on a grill," he said. "If you grill outdoors often, you'll want the ease of a gas grill. This grill is a very nice, top of the line stainless steel grill. Stainless steel grills are great, but go for whatever you can afford to get you cooking outdoors. Obviously, if you spend a lot of time entertaining and cooking for the masses, you want to invest in a nice grill. But if you're throwing an occasional party of cooking for the family, you don't need to go all out on a grill."
Blashaw also shared these products to make your outdoor grilling and dining experience a better one:
LED grill light
If you're grilling late into the evening, running out of daylight, we've got something for that. This is a battery powered LED light from Brinkmann. They're available at Home Depot for about 20 bucks, and they're really easy to use. It clamps onto your grill and you can point and bend the light so you can see what you're cooking. Because it's LED, both the bulb and the battery will last a long time. Best part? Batteries included.
Outdoor Kitchen Cart
Two important things you have in the kitchen that you don't have outdoors are cabinets and countertops! The cart seen on "The Early Show" was handmade. You simply take a damaged kitchen cabinet we found in a store. We put it on wheels and added a nice wooden top. Now you can be organized! You have storage inside and very important, you have a work surface. We also added accessories like a shelf for condiments, handy hooks to hang your cooking utensils, and a paper towel holder. When you're done, just wheel it away to the garage, ready for the next cookout. You can find old cabinets like this any time someone re-models their kitchen or you can find them at salvage yards. You can find also buy kitchen carts like this, pre-made. But instead of having an old cabinet end up in a land fill, why not give it new life as an outdoor kitchen cart?
Coolers (Standard Rubbermaid cooler, metal basin, inflatable ice container for drinks and salad bar)
You can go the simple route with a good plastic ice chest for perishables, these are available everywhere and pretty inexpensive. For the drinks, you might want to get creative. This is a galvanized metal basin full of ice. You could paint it or leave it plain. Just fill it with ice and you have an inviting drink cooler. You could use just about any kind of large, shallow container for a drink cooler. And finally, an inflatable ice container and you can find them online for about 13 bucks. First you fill it with air, then with ice. It can be used for anything from a cold salad bar or to keep drinks cold. When the party's over, let out the air and it takes up very little space.
Mesh bonnets
How do you keep bugs out of your potato salad? These mesh bonnets are perfect for that, and when you're done they collapse for easy, compact storage. And again, very inexpensive, going for $11 online.
Lanita Ware plates, cups and spoons
Also, take a look at plates and cups from Lanita Ware. One thing people like to do outside is walk around with their food and drinks. Yes, that can get messy! Here are some special plates to solve that problem. They're plastic and sturdy, but also very deep so the food doesn't slide off. And it's easy to hold in one hand. And this space is for your drink -- your food and your drink held all in one hand!