Jamie Oliver

A TV series all about BBQ; a book all about BBQ. Jamie Oliver has cooked just about everything everywhere, but outside over the grill is the chef’s happy place. RUPERT BATES reports

It is no surprise to learn that this magazine has advocated #BBQ365 since day one. But when Jamie Oliver calls on the nation to embrace year-round outdoor cooking, the nation answers.

The noise you heard was keyboards clicking in digital search of the nearest source of a brand-new BBQ and homeowners crashing through their bifold doors to dust off the grills and wonder where on earth they put their chimney starter. What time does the butcher open?

I caught up with the chef’s three-part Channel 4 series Jamie’s Ultimate BBQ with Weber, complete with a new book Jamie Oliver BBQ, just as we headed into a scorching May bank holiday weekend. First up, naturally, was an attempt to replicate his full English breakfast. Sausages on skewers I knew about for ease of turning, but rashers of smoked streaky bacon threaded onto a skewer is a flag that should be waved every morning in the garden.

Eggs coddled in grilled peppers, tomato bread, baked beans and stuffed mushrooms all hit the grill, but for some reason Jamie chose his great mentor and legendary Italian chef Gennaro Contaldo as his breakfast sous chef ahead of me.

The TV recipes, also found in the book, come thick and fast, hot and smoky. Jamie cooks up sirloin steak, explaining rare, medium rare and medium. If you want it well done, you’re probably watching the wrong programme. The series is beautifully shot in the gardens and the woods around his Essex home, the smoke and sizzle permeating the screen, Jamie as natural and engaging in front of the camera as he was when he entered our kitchens as The Naked Chef 27 years and 30 books ago.

“Anyone who loves to barbecue will know what I mean when I say there’s really nothing like it. There’s something wonderfully primal about cooking over fire; it really requires you to tune into your instincts, reacting and responding to get the best from the grill. I’ve always wanted to write a barbecue book. Cooking outside is one of my happiest places,” says Jamie.

“I’ve always advocated bringing people together around food. That mealtime moment is so important. When you throw barbecuing into the mix, you gain connection around the whole process of cooking.”

Jamie says we’re naturally drawn to fire, with the grill becoming a place to gather and a shared experience. “I believe it’s uplifting for the soul. Taking the time to enjoy it all, allows us to slow down and appreciate the simple things in life, and that is an important lesson that can be applied to all areas of our lives.”

The series is in partnership with Weber, and the collaboration is both overt and subtle at the same time. We see the gamut of grills – charcoal kettle, gas, electric and plancha – cooked on, their individual merits extolled, cooking techniques and heat zones explained, with Dan Cooper and Jon Finch from Weber, both regular BBQ magazine recipe chefs and contributors, playing a big part in the making of the series.

Jamie’s family join in at various moments, be it cooking or feasting. Step forward son Buddy and his chicken Caesar salad. Woodchips in a smoke box on the grill, chicken rubbed in herby oil, lemons charred, Greek yoghurt in the mix and more of that streaky bacon. If Caesar himself had rustled up this salad, Brutus would never have stabbed him in the back.

Lamb lollipops followed on Weber’s electric Lumin, with whipped feta cheese and a pistachio crust, Jamie reminding viewers that an electric BBQ, with no naked flame, can work on an apartment balcony, or small urban garden.

Butterflied lamb is another Jamie go-to. He also sates the appetite of curry lovers; while, when it comes to grilled fish tacos with stone fruit salsa, you envy the scallops laying on top of butter in their shells on the charcoal grill.

A burger, of course, has to get a BBQ outing, in this case sesame chicken.

Don’t forget the gochujang yoghurt. Vegetables on the grill are showcased, mezze style, with baba ganoush, mint and chilli courgettes, sweet peppers and tear-and-share flatbread. I was distracted by the halloumi and apricots gatecrashing the party.

“For me, it’s all about the fire, so a charcoal barbecue is my natural go-to. But making the TV show I cooked on a range of different gas and electric barbecues and was very impressed with them all. Gas can be very convenient, so I can see why so many people love it, and electric was really interesting too – a great new innovation and a brilliant option if you’re limited on space.”

In each episode Jamie brings in a guest chef. Sam Evans and Shauna Guinn of Hang Fire BBQ in Wales showcased their love and knowledge of Mexican food on the Weber slate, with their spin on an Oaxacan tlayuda – a Mexican style pizza with fresh chorizo on the plancha. “Let the flavours get to know each other,” says Sam.

Melissa Thompson, chef and author of Fired Up, spoke to her Jamaican heritage with a jerk pork belly, dry rubbed and marinated on an electric grill over bay leaves with roasted cabbage, while food writer Rukmini Iyer, whose books include The Green Barbecue, cooked spiced paneer kofta with grilled watermelon and halloumi salad.

“Over thousands of years, the cinders, the fire, the genius of cooking, was driven by women. I believe women have an innate ability to cook over fire – a very sensual one, feeling, touching, control,” Jamie told Times Radio.

“I hope my book has a nice balance, visually and emotionally, of recipe concepts that are both feminine and masculine. It can’t just be massive hunks of meat, big knives, beards and tattoos. BBQ is for everyone.”

The TV series ended with a surf and turf mixed grill on the plancha – chicken thighs, chorizo, king prawns, mussels and clams, green beans and cherry tomatoes, with the slate on the BBQ catching the fat and sharing the flavours.

One final tip was Jamie cleaning the plancha with wine and butter, which then doubled up as a sauce to pour over the dish. That hack triggered memories of the late great chef and bon viveur Keith Floyd, all flambeed flamboyance, revolutionising food television in the 1980s and 1990s by taking cooking outdoors to locations far and wide. That wine would not have ended up cleaning the grill that’s for sure.

It also made me think about a missing ingredient in the force of food nature that is the Jamie Oliver Group. Jamie opened Barbecoa in London, everything cooked over wood, back in 2010, before many other restaurants followed the flame he lit, casting open fire as the hero of the kitchen.

His love of BBQ is authentic and absolute. How good would it be to have Jamie out in the field and the festivals, up close and personal with the public, alongside all the other great chefs grilling live on fire pits and fire stages across the UK. And maybe Barbecoa needs to be reignited too.