Global “Grill” Warming: Danver’s Firing Up Your Grill in the Dead of Winter

Solaire Infrared burner

As the days get shorter and darker, you might begin to long for those balmy summer months – including, of course, those outdoor days filled with fun in the sun and the mouth-watering smell of grilled delicacies permeating the air.

While we might not be able to make the sun shine brighter, Danver is happy to say that we can add a little “warmth” to your holiday season with our year-round outdoor kitchen products. Infrared grilling technology stays hot, even in the colder weather, and heats your food as if it was Christmas in July.

Danver has been associated with Solaire Grills by Rasmussen Iron Works for almost 10 years. We have come to view infrared grilling technology as the best way to grill using direct heat. With the proliferation of specialty cooking appliances for outdoor use, many people are choosing the best cooking appliances for each cooking style. This means, in most cases, appliances that come from different manufacturers in the same outdoor kitchen (a story for another blog; check out our cooking options).

 Traditional grill burners get hot over a long warm-up period and typically only get up to 600-800 degrees F. Since they produce heat over a relatively small area and transfer that heat into secondary elements (ceramic briquettes, rods, lava rock, etc.) in an attempt to heat the grilling area evenly, hot spots are common and much of the burner heat is reflected downward. The result is circulating hot air, or convection cooking, causing your food to dry out.

The simplest way I have found to describe infrared cooking is to imagine charcoal when it is at its peak of heat. It is a red/orange glow with the highest heat it will produce giving you the ideal heat to sear the food. The problem with charcoal is that it is only peaks for a short time before it starts to lose temperature. With an infrared grill, you can get the great flavor of an intensely-hot charcoal fire with the control, convenience and consistency of gas, and it only takes 3 minutes to heat up! This heat (1200-1300 degrees F) gives a true sear, sealing in the juices of whatever it is you are cooking; steak, fish, chicken, pork or vegetables. Infrared energy actually drives moisture away from the surface and deep into the item being grilled. This process enhances flavor and creates a succulence that is difficult to replicate with other cooking methods.  Interested in more details? Click here for the technical explanation of infrared cooking.

Cooking is time and temperature related and it is no different for grilling. The consistency of infrared burners gives you the same result every time you cook once you determine the time required at each temperature (high, medium and low). The burner always gives you the same temperature with no hot and cold spots, so you are not moving the food around the grates to guess at equalizing the cooking time on the hot and cold spots. One of my favorite recipes for summer and winter  is a flank steak marinated with Allegro Brand Marinade, searing each side on high for 2 1/2 minutes, and then finishing at Med-Low for 3 minutes on each side for medium rare–every time! The cooking time is the same no matter the air temperature!

Email us or call us at 203-269-2300 to find out more about our outdoor kitchen products,  infrared cooking in general, and Solaire in particular.

Here are some infrared grilling recipes to get you started:  Great Grilling Simplified.

Releasing you from the confinement of the indoors, expand your cuisine to include a few new holiday recipes.

From our grill to yours, here are some of our winter grilling favorites. Happy Holidays!

Bobby Flay’s Apple-Sage Glazed Grilled Turkey

Paula Deen’s Pork Tenderloin with Orange and Soy

Gale Gand’s Grilled Bread Pudding with Fresh Fruit

*Recipes courtesy of foodnetwork.com

DANVER Offers High Style and Low-Maintenance Finishes for Outdoor Kitchens

As the growth in outdoor kitchens has spread to more and more areas of the country, we are seeing a growing demand for a variety of door finishes. In addition to offering a variety of design options, we know no one wants to spend their time cleaning or maintaining the finish on their stainless cabinets. We have addressed these concerns in 3 ways:

PAINT
We have built several stainless kitchens where the doors and drawer fronts were painted with colors that blend in with their surroundings such as stone and masonry, or wooded yards or plantings. The painted natural colors give the kitchen a more rustic look while the stainless construction preserves the resilience of the cabinets, creating a low-maintenance product.

CLEAR COAT
Our clear Protect-A-Coat finish continues to be popular for kitchens near salt water and pool areas. This virtually maintenance-free coating retains the stainless look while offering maximum protection against chlorine and corrosive chemicals like muriatic acid, which is frequently used to clean pavers.

POWDER COATED WOOD FINISHES
The base powder coat seals the stainless from the environment like Protect-A-Coat, while setting the base color of the desired wood species. Then inks depicting the grain of the desired wood species are transferred permanently into the base coat. Result: extremely realistic wood finishes that are unaffected by the environmental conditions! We offer 10 different wood finishes.

No matter where you live or your design needs we have maintenance-free option that will finish your outdoor kitchen!

For more information on our extensive-line of maintenance-free finishes, designed to stand-up to any climate conditions, visit the DANVER Web site.

STEP BEYOND JUST GRILLING WITH AN OUTDOOR KITCHEN

Creating an outdoor kitchen area to spend quality time with family and friends is now even easier. DANVER Stainless Steel Cabinetry’s professional advice, functional design and high-quality products offer outdoor kitchen spaces that go beyond just grilling. As the leading provider of outdoor kitchen products including stainless steel cabinetry, grills, specialty burners, pizza ovens, refrigerators and freezers, DANVER is committed to personalizing the outdoor living experience.

 

Why Outdoor Kitchens?

• Increase home value, usable living space and functionality.
• Offer advanced cooking options. Cook over an open flame or smoke meat for home-cooked BBQ.
• Spend more time with friends and family. With an outdoor kitchen preparing meals and socializing with guest and family is now possible without having to spend time inside retrieving plates, food, tools, etc
• Year-round use. There are many options including outdoor fireplaces or portable heaters that allow use of the space no matter what the outside temperature or weather conditions.

There are a few important rules to remember when creating an outdoor living space, the most significant being that the difference between indoor and outdoor kitchen design is the exposure to the elements. It is critical, therefore, to decide carefully about the materials chosen to design an outdoor kitchen. DANVER recommends high-quality stainless steel as it provides a sanitary surface, is easily cleaned, 100 percent recyclable and corrosion-resistant.

In addition, plan the design to encompass the entire outdoor entertaining space as part of a single functional plan. Dining areas, cooking areas and pool areas often coexist. Think of these as outdoor rooms and consider the flow of traffic as part of the design.

For more information on DANVER’s outdoor kitchen offerings or to design an outdoor kitchen, visit www.danver.com and call 888.441.0537.

Danver Develops Range Hood Specifically for Outdoor Applications

With the explosion of outdoor kitchens all over the country, towns and cities are looking at a bonanza for permits and fees. One of the things required more and more is ventilation for barbeques where the area has any overhead cover. In Florida, the lanai or pool cage is a popular place to put the outdoor kitchen and under that cover, ventilation may be required. In the Southwest and California we find many covered outdoor living areas that include kitchens and they too are beginning to require ventilation.

The number of requests we have gotten for BBQ hoods has increased dramatically over the past year. In investigating what is available in the market, the deepest hoods available were 27″ front to back. This is ok for indoor ranges, but most grills cannot be put against a wall and stick out further than the hood can draw. Hood manufacturers recommend that the hood be mounted off the wall 4″ or so to help with this problem. This necessitates that the installer build some sort of box to add the depth. This area then has to be finished separately. This adds cost and complexity to the hood installation.

Danver’s cabinet line was developed with the cost of installation in mind. Improvements to the cabinet line focused on helping installers reduce their labor which in turn can flow to the consumer. With this in mind, Danver worked with a major US hood manufacturer to develop a 32″ deep Stainless BBQ hood to complement the stainless outdoor kitchens Danver is known for. The extra depth will capture the whole grilling area and be able to be installed just like any indoor range hood saving installation dollars.

By being sensitive to the fact that the market REQUIRES an outdoor hood but doesn’t necessarily WANT one, Danver worked with the manufacturer to hit a very competitive price point. The result is three sizes to handle most applications, 36″, 48″ and 60″. They will be available in early June and orders can be taken today.

Stainless Outdoor Kitchen with Hood

UPDATE: THESE UNITS ARE ALSO NOW AVAILABLE AS HOOD LINERS SO THEY CAN BE BUILT INTO ANY HOOD. THEY CAN ALSO BE USED INDOORS WHERE EXTRA DEPTH IN CAPTURE AREA IS DESIRED.

Please visit our website or contact us for more information.

Mitch

Danver Provides Free Outdoor Kitchen Design Tool!

Outdoor Kitchen Layout using Danver Design Document

Introduced in September, our frequently updated outdoor kitchen design program is catching on. The drawing tool was created in Microsoft Word so that any person might be able to use it without requiring a special software program and without having to learn special drawing commands.

The user simply has to open the Danver Cabinet Library document and then use the standard Word commands like copy, cut and paste to create their own kitchen layouts. All of the cabinets in the line are scaled to size and are in the document below the example kitchen on the first page. Also available on our web site is the Island Insert Library containing our framed doors, drawers, combinations and accessories for masonry, brick or stone Barbeque Islands where full cabinetry is not required. Both libraries can use the products from either library interchangeably where cabinetry and inserts together make sense in a design. The same door and pull are used in both cabinets and inserts so a combination of both in the same island will look consistent.

Currently the drawing tool only provides an elevation (front view), but the feedback we get is that it really helps people see what their kitchen will look like. Since it is so easy to use, different variations can be created in a matter of minutes to help finalize a design. The cabinet library includes many of the appliances that are available, some of which are sold by Danver.

I invite everyone to try the program and send comments to us. Please visit our website or contact us for more information.

Mitch

Outdoor Stainless Kitchen in winter in CT

Florio Stainless Outdoor Kitchen

Here is a typical stainless kitchen installed in a stone surround. Most of the kitchens using our stainless cabinets are installed in surrounds consisting of stone, brick, masonry,stucco, etc. with some kind of stone counter top like granite.

This kitchen has one of the most popular items in today’s outdoor kitchens: a power burner! It is the low burner in the picture. This is the Alfresco 24″ Versa Burner and provides heat up to 65,000 BTUs! It is in our custom low cabinet so the homeowner can use a large stock pot for things like lobster or crab boils and they need to see into the pot. The tremendous range of temperature provided by the Versa Burner allows things like sauces to be simmered at low temperatures to boiling large pots of water or stews. These are much more versatile than standard side burners provided by grill manufacturers which can be ineffectual on cold or windy days.

Please visit our website or contact us for more information.

Mitch

Danver now distributing Award Winning Pizza Oven

New Outdoor Pizza Ovens

Danver has built outdoor kitchen cabinets since 2000 and has pioneered outdoor kitchen designs. In the past 2 years, our dealers have requested that we carry appliances for cooking and refrigeration to give them a single source for their outdoor kitchen needs. We have added several cooking appliances including grills, griddles, power burners, side burners, sear burners and refrigerators with single doors, 2-drawers or 3-drawers. For outdoor bar areas we carry 24″ and 30″ bartending centers and beer dispensers.

One of the items that was frequently requested was a wood-fired pizza oven. The problem for us was that most were imported clay ovens that needed to be built into elaborate tower-like structures that were difficult to build and overly expensive. Add to that the 1.5-2 hours it took for the oven to get up to temperature, and you couldn’t just say on a Sunday afternoon “Hey, let’s make a pizza!” without an elaborate plan. At the January 2009 International Builders’ Show, I came across a pizza oven that met our requirements. It is wood-fired and heats up in 10-15 minutes! I watched it work at the recent HPBA (Hearth, Patio and Barbeque Association) show in Reno where it won the Vesta Award for Best New Product! We have gotten the rights to distribute it through our channel and we designed a cabinet for it so it can fit in a Danver kitchen like any other cooking appliance. It’s a versatile oven that can cook anything from pizzas to poultry to ribs and more with a delicious wood smoked taste. Check it out above and on our site!

Mitch

Chapman Kitchenette

Chapman Kitchenette

Photo above is of a recent project we are very excited about.

Please visit our website or contact us for more information.