Sizzling chimenea cooking trends for 2025

It keeps you warm, emits beautiful mood lighting, looks gorgeous… and you can cook up a storm on it! A food smoker on top of your chimenea’s chimney is a thing of wonder and delight, and that’s only the start of the story. Here are some tasty ideas for BBQ and chimenea cooking, trends you’ll love to jump on board.

Garden dining ideas – Cool chimenea cooking trend setters

Cooking on a real fire is inspiring everyone from famous chefs to home cooks, celebrating the ancient appeal of cooking over open flames in a world that sometime seems to be going totally mad. This is the ultimate in comfort food, with the unique scents of outdoor cuisine adding rich flavours and thrilling textures to dishes, ultimately reconnecting us with those comforting old culinary traditions.

At the same time people are getting ever-more adventurous. Unusual herbs and spices, exotic vegetables and fusions of different cultures are hot news, including bold stuff like Korea-inspired marinades and fragrant Cajun seasonings, all designed to enrich the BBQ lifestyle. How about giving something like African grill specialty suya a try, a fierce Nigerian chili spice beef kebab, or even yassa, a tasty Senegalese mustard-grilled style of chicken. Experiment with pulled pork eggrolls, tiger cry beef and Thai sausage dumplings.

Vegan and vegetarian BBQing is another big trend as climate change experts and medical professionals encourage us to eat less red meat, a LOT less processed meat like sausages, bacon and ham, all big health sinners, plus more grains, veg and fruit. Meat eaters are getting increasingly into locally-farmed meats, cutting down the portions to create a more sensible meat-veg balance.

Pescatarians add fish to the BBQ menu, with a focus on fresh tuna, fresh shark, shellfish and other marine exotica. Make it sustainable fish and you tick the responsible box as well as creating supreme flavours by experimenting with unfamiliar seafood. Such fun.

Locally grown and produced ingredients are a biggie for 2025 as people become ever-more aware of the often-bonkers distances their food has travelled. Keeping an eye on food miles means you’ll likely be barbecuing seasonal fare, adding a familiar old-school feel to your alfresco life.

Salt is a bugger. We only need a tiny amount of it daily to keep us healthy and too much can be a catastrophe. A marked trend for salt alternatives like low sodium salt and umami-flavoured MSG or monosodium glutamate are replacing everyday salt for our wellbeing’s sake, without sacrificing on that glorious BBQ flavour.

Make your own beautiful BBQ butter by adding spice and tang to everyday salted or non-salted butter. Think chunks of fresh garlic, shallot, parsley, paprika, cayenne pepper, mustard, horseradish or even a good dollop of wonderful Worcestershire sauce.

And kebabs are massive, no surprise when you can make such a broad variety of them and they’re so easy to eat outdoors thanks to the skewer. Choose an all-fruit dessert kebab served with ice cream, a vegetarian kebab showcasing as many different veg as you can squeeze on, a chicken kebab featuring free range chook, which always tastes so much better than factory-farmed without breaking the bank, or kebabs based on your favourite take-aways. Fish and chip kebabs. A Chinese takeaway kebab with five spices, a pizza kebab with melted cheese and dough balls, the possibilities are endless.

There has been an enormous boom in home businesses since covid, a real treat for BBQ cooking fans. Small batch and locally-produced sauces and rubs are vying with wood smoking chips and various unusual ingredients for a top spot as far as flavour goes. See what you can find in your local independent health shop, town market, farm shop or online.

Because a chimenea is so fuel-efficient you don’t have to feel too madly guilty about firing her up for a cooking session. You won’t waste fuel either, since the design means they leave little or no ash behind.

Brilliant BBQ recipe destinations for 2025

So where do you go for actual recipes? Try these five BBQ foodie hot-spots!

• Toxigon, home of authentic BBQ food trends from the USA, all a bit meaty so perfect for you carnivores!
• Backyard BBQ – oodles of deliciousness to make your guests smile
• Grill Girl Robyn’s Pinterest page, an absolute inspiration
• BBQ recipe trends from the DIY people at Wickes
• The Woolf’s Kitchen – simply marvellous

Mooch over to out chimenea accessory department for all the cooking kit you could possible need. Then go make magic – we can almost smell it from here!