UK Build Ideas

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gavlar

Fire Starter
Original poster
May 26, 2015
46
10
Surrey
Hi everyone

This is my first posting here as I only joined yesterday. I am based in Surrey and have been smoking for 15 years. I have Brinkmann Pitmaster and vertical smoker. Both are not perfect but have served me well over the years.

I am looking to build an outdoor kitchen over the next few weeks and need some ideas and advice. I have looked at many US based websites and all the plans from brick built serve people with acres of land. Like many of us here in the UK, our gardens and small and we need to balance the garden with cooking area accordingly.

Of course I want the world on a stick, yes to a pizza oven but any over will be great, I want to smoke long and slow and a design that will support a long slow burn overnight would be great, Oh and a grill too.

I am thinking of block built which will be rendered.

I am really keen to see how you guys have built smokers here in the UK. All advice, pics and guidance is welcome.

Cheers

Gavlar
 
Hello Gavlar.  Welcome to the family.

This is a tough one.  I can show you links to some FANTASTIC brick builds but these are HUGE!  by U.K. garden standards.  One is here in the U.K..  ALL the bells and whistles.  I'm afraid you will have to come up with a drawing that will fit your garden and budget and see what options we can offer.  Between the U.K. members and the U.S. members we can help you with ideas for the smoker but we need some idea of what you are thinking of.  Keep Smokin!

Danny
 
Hi Galvar

What kind of dimensions are you looking for? A rough conceptual sketch would be a great help. If you are wanting to grill and cook low and slow are you willing to have a little bit of steel work fabricated to sit within the block work?
 
Hi Gavlar, welcome to the "Family"

Not built a range myself, but there are plenty of people on here who have, and I am sure they will help you with your design.

Smokin Monkey [emoji]133660013031[/emoji]
 
Thanks everyone for welcoming me to the group. I will draw up some rough design ideas over the next few days. However for now the dimensions will be around 2000mm long 900mm deep and around the standard height of a kitchen worktop. It will be against a timber fence so will need to think about protecting that.

I have thought about setting my pitmaster into the top to act as the grill but not too fussed. I have also read about setting a grill on a car Jack system to raise and lower the coals from the grill.

I think in reality the smoker only needs to be small as I would only be smoking a shoulder of pork and chicken at any one time, and this section still probably have to be higher than the worktop height.

So much to think about and such little space..
 
I think in reality the smoker only needs to be small as I would only be smoking a shoulder of pork and chicken at any one time
It sounds as if you intend to simply grill everything else !

Even the humble burger, chicken wing and banger are enhanced by a combination of direct and indirect cooking. You are still at the design stage and i think you would be missing a big opportunity by not enabling your whole grill area to double up as a kettle/smoker BBQ too.
 
Not at all Wade

In fact this is exactly my reasoning for the post. In a way it is a collaborative design. I will post some pics of the area I am looking to build on shortly.

Curious to learn what types ob blocks are suitable for use here, breeze block, structural blocks or concrete ones? Do i need to use fire bricks too and where are the best places to buy fire bricks?
 
Gavlar, ever thought of a Big Green Egg or similar? Can BBQ, Smoke the lot and not too big. Nice Marble top?

Other than that, have you thought of using Vermiculit as an insulator, I have used it in two ovens now, it's very light weight and easy to work, think its. 5-1 ration with cement. Lots of Pizza Oven Builders use it. Do a Google search.

100 Ltr bag on ebay about £21.00
 
I have a Brinkmann stick burner, obviously it is not built in but it does everything.  For instance I use the firebox as a grill, and also to contain my cold smoke generator when cold smoking in the main oven space, and when I want to hot smoke I use the whole thing. As space seems to be an issue  If you managed to design something on the same principle, that also managed to incorporate a pizza oven somewhere into the system, you would have it all.  You have not mentioned what your budget is for your project? 

Oh by the way welcome to the forum.
 
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Hello Gavlar.  Yeah.  These are some things we can't help you decide.  Do you want to impress the neighbours?  Would you like to save money?  Have you just made up your mind that a brick/block build is what you want and the price be damned?  None of these things are a bad thing but they are things we can REALLY help with.  When you start talking a totally unprotected outdoor kitchen you are talking brick/block design and stone counter tops, high quality stainless steel fittings such as taps.  TOTALLY sanitising the ENTIRE kitchen before starting EVERY smoke.  A lot of money and work.  If you are good with that then go for your dream!  Below is a thread by one of our members.  Now keep in mind he works in the Middle East as a close security body guard for VERY rich people.  He paid to have this built.  Close security means he MAY have to take a bullet.  I have NO reason to believe he would lie to me ( maybe I am wrong, have been before ).  My point being money is NOT much of an issue.  I post this link to show you what you could build.  He bought the pizza oven and incorporated it into his build.  Go online and price a wood fired pizza oven.

These are things you have to decide.  We will get you all the help we can once you choose a direction.  Help us to help you.  There are other options but it must be your choice.  Keep Smokin!

Danny

http://www.smokingmeatforums.com/t/166244/my-brick-smoker-build
 
I checked out that build prior to my posting. Agreed its a big beast...Yeah I know jealousy.

Anyway I will post some pics of the area and rough sketches of what I hope to look like..I am now thinking of setting my existing pitmaster into the block unit with heat coming from the main brick fire through the offset vent.
 
Hello.  Give us your thoughts and we will help were we can  I will also rattle cages if I think someone in the States can help.  No matter your plans we can ( and want to ) help make this happen for you.  Keep Smokin!

Danny
 


Hi Guys



Well i have finally got round to modelling the cooking area i hope to build. As you can see i hope to build the fire box to the left hand side with the fire at the bottom left. I have put a grey rectangle to act as the door. Above that i hope to have some kind of method of diverting the heat into the horizontal bbq unit which will probably be my Brinkmann pitmaster. Finally the top grey door i was thinking of having as the entrance to the pizza oven but not sure how it would work.



As mentioned before this is just a rough sketch and open to any thoughts and comments. the length of the space is about 2M and i would want the depth to be no more that a standard kitchin worktop (600mm)



Cheers all



Gavlar
 

Hi Guys

Well i have finally got round to modelling the cooking area i hope to build. As you can see i hope to build the fire box to the left hand side with the fire at the bottom left. I have put a grey rectangle to act as the door. Above that i hope to have some kind of method of diverting the heat into the horizontal bbq unit which will probably be my Brinkmann pitmaster. Finally the top grey door i was thinking of having as the entrance to the pizza oven but not sure how it would work.

As mentioned before this is just a rough sketch and open to any thoughts and comments. the length of the space is about 2M and i would want the depth to be no more that a standard kitchin worktop (600mm)

Cheers all

Gavlar
 
Hi Gavlar.  Just my opinion here.  You are trying to design a "one size fits all" unit.  In my limited experience, that means it does multiple tasks, half assed.  So it WORKS as a smoker, well maybe.  It works a pizza oven sort of.  So you have a pizza oven that is poor and a smoker that is poor.  Don't mean to rain on your parade.  Maybe there is a design out there that would work but not what I see here.  A pizza oven needs to be AT LEAST 400+ degrees so the distance from fire to oven is too much.  So the problem becomes how do we get CRAZY heat to the pizza oven and then get low and slow heat to the smoker?  Obviously not at the same time but can the 2 objectives be built into the same unit?  Heat control is gonna be a Bear! with your idea. You got me thinking.  Not that I know all.  Far from it!  Just rolling it around in my little brain.  I know it may sound simple, but once built you may find many problems.  You want to do it right the first time.  Will get back to you.

Danny
 
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Thanks Danny

It is only a sketch and as I said originally. I want the best of everything. My true love is long and slow and have been happy with my kit for many years.

I am now re landscaping my garden and want a contemporary liking outdoor cooking area. I am happy to discard my brinkmann and go all block and fire bricks if it will provide more control and consistent temperatures.

Naturally grilling is a must to please those that want the humble sausage.

I am seriously open to all ideas I am just restricted by the space I have allocated.

Cheers

Gavlar
 
For the Pizza oven you really need the fire inside the oven itself in order to get you the top heat that is required. This will allow you to separate the two functions but have them built into the same structure. Maybe something like this...

 
The fire in the Pizza oven only heats the oven and the firebox for the smoker only heats the smoker.

As Danny points out, if you try to combine the two together then you will probably end up with something that is not very good at doing either.
 
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Hello.  Yeah Wade!  I was thinking along those lines.  Could we make the pizza oven also the firebox for the smoker??  But you would need to be able to close off the smoker when only using the oven.  Well!  Maybe the smoker could act as part of the exhaust for the oven??  But then you would still need some sort of "damper" between oven and smoker because of the volume of the smoker being used as an exhaust.  The oven would never reach 400-500 degrees with that much exhaust.  Yes the pizza oven may be about knee high, which is not "ideal" but you see where I am going here?  Then we are also talking brick.  I have almost no experience using a brick pit and no experience building one.  Seems to me as with any smoker you need to get the brick up to temp.  Does that take a lot of extra wood??  Should we be thinking of gas for fuel and a few coals for taste?  I'll give Wes a PM and see if he can help.  He's the brick man!  Obviously, you can not grill and smoke in the same unit at the same time, but the grilling thing is an easy fix.  Just add a cleanout door on the smoker and put coals in there for grilling.  Keep Smokin!

Danny
 
The problem with trying to use the pizza oven as the fire box is the oven design. Usually the fire is at the back and the flu is towards the front. There is probably a way that you could get the oven to double up as the smoker firebox but I think it would be quite a Heath Robinson affair. You would probably need to have a vent in one side of the oven for when it is used as a firebox and the flue at the top for when it is a pizza oven. You would need to be able to open and close either depending on which you were using. Someone on here will probably have done it though.
 
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