Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet News and Press

Portland Press Herald
May, 2006

In an interview with the paper, Connie Dove describes her Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet grill as the "best investment we made in our home all year."

Great Outdoors

By RAY ROUTHIER, Portland Press Herald Writer

Sunday, May 28, 2006

As soon as Connie Dove mentions how much she paid for her new outdoor grill, she knows it sounds a little crazy.

"Who would pay $10,000 for a grill, right?" says Dove, who lives in the Cape Neddick section of York. "It's a big decision, but it was probably the best investment we made in our home all year. With the warranty, and the power it has, it's probably worth every penny."

Dove has more than a typical grill. Essentially, she has a one-piece outdoor kitchen.

Dove and her husband bought a grill/kitchen called the Bread Breaker by Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet. Kalamazoo has been making outdoor kitchen consoles since the early 1990s.

Their giant, heavy-duty, features-laden units have been dubbed the Hummer of grills.

Dove's Bread Breaker has four cooking areas and functions on three kinds of fuel (wood, charcoal, propane). It also boasts a special wok burner, rotisserie, underneath storage cabinets and a warming shelf.

The [stainless steel] grates are so heavy Dove says she can only lift them off the grill with a special tool that comes with the unit.

Dove says she cooked a 25-pound turkey in 90 minutes last Thanksgiving on the grill, which she and her husband have dubbed "Big Bertha."

What she likes best about the grill - besides the fact that in the summer she can do all her cooking outdoors - is that she feels like she's made a permanent investment in the value of her home and an upgrade to her lifestyle.

The outdoor kitchen trend, once thought only to be popular in warm climates, is slowly moving into the north and into Maine.

The idea of having a really high-end outdoor kitchen setup fits with the philosophy that if you live in a place with a short summer, you better do everything you can to take advantage of it. You better spend as much time as possible outdoors.

"I know here in Michigan, once spring hits, I want to spend every minute I can outdoors, and I think that attitude is helping to fuel this trend," said Geoffrey Bullard, chief designer at Kalamazoo Outdoor Gourmet, based in Kalamazoo, Mich.

"And also now these things can be built more easily, with stainless steel cabinets, and shipped to the home. It used to be, 25 years ago, if you wanted an outdoor kitchen you had to build it from scratch."

PRICES FROM $1,000 TO $20,000

Kalamazoo specializes in custom outdoor kitchen units that range from a grill with extra burners and rotisseries and cabinets underneath, like the one Dove bought, to larger consoles that resemble indoor kitchens, and include refrigerators and granite counter tops. Those sell for as much as $20,000.

Bullard says Kalamazoo outdoor kitchen units are watertight, and some have heating coils to melt snow off them. The cooking burners, grills, cabinets, etc., are made in free-standing units that can be attached to form a long unit or island, or can be configured in various shapes...

Dove and her husband, Moe Houde, run Houde Home Construction and do a lot of outdoor entertaining for clients and for employees. So their outdoor kitchen is partly a business expense.

But Dove also likes the fact that during the summer, she never has to cook in her hot kitchen if she doesn't want to.

"I've got my pots and pans, the charcoal, everything I need is in (the grill)," said Dove.

Dove and her husband have cooked roast chicken, roast pork, Thanksgiving turkey, and all manner of barbecue and side dishes with it.

And because Kalamazoo customizes the product (as do other outdoor kitchen makers) Dove was able to get the Houde Home Construction logo engraved into the grill grates.

Kalamazoo offers a lifetime warranty on the body and most of the structural parts of the unit, and a one-year warranty on things like igniters, rotisserie motors and electronics.

ADDING SPACE TO HOME

With a warranty like that, Dove looks at her outdoor kitchen as a permanent investment in the value of her home.

"Outdoor kitchens do increase home value because they add usable space to your home," said Heidi Karpa, a Chicago-based interior designer and a kitchen design specialist for HGTV (Home and Garden Television). "For years we had heard people talking about bringing the outdoors in - well, this is an extension of that idea, of that flow."

Karpa said that besides outdoor cooking units, manufacturers are also cranking out other products that help people use their patios and yards more, including lights, small, free-standing fireplaces and heating lamps.

One patio heater available at Home Depot is made by Endless Summer, and retails for $299. It looks like a big floor lamp and is supposed to heat a 20-foot circular area. It runs on propane.

Karpa said that more and more people are thinking of their backyard as a place to gather with friends and family, not just a place to cook steaks on a small grill and then bring them inside to eat.

"You're really creating a kitchen/sitting room, and emotional space," said Karpa. "It can be amazing how much this can add to your life."