PRO DU C T OF THE MONTH
Return to the fire pit The times of the sole chef at the barbeque are gone. The idea behind the innovative Kugelblitz (‘ball lightning’) was to design a barbeque in a way that would bring people together around the fire. The Kugelblitz achieves this goal and also convinces with its health benefits. Fireplace or barbeque? Both, actually! TEXT: MARILENA STRACKE I PHOTOS: KUGELBLITZ
In our society, barbequing has become reminiscent of high-performance sports. These days, it’s not about the joy of it: what matters instead is ‘top performance’. Who can grill the best meat most efficiently? Usually, it’s just one person who oversees the barbeque on their own. The other guests mights pop by for just a few minutes and talk shop about the best barbequing techniques. The Kugelblitz serves as the emotional counterpart and aims to re-write barbeque history. Going back to our original roots, it’s far more than just a grill. There’s a whole philosophy behind it, a future vision of barbeques and togetherness. The distinctive design makes the fire the centre of attention once again, a place 12 | Issue 76 | July 2019
it held in our humankind community for centuries. “It’s a very different attitude towards life compared to the one of individualists at the barbeque,” managing partner Sebastian Berndt describes. “For us, it’s not about speed – we focus on togetherness instead, and on consciously appreciating the fire, sensing its vital energy. Indeed, we want to bring people together around the fire – as they have been doing for thousands of years.” For inventor Andreas Weinfurtner, it was also important to find an alternative to the cooking grid. “When meat is grilled directly above the embers, the mix of fat, spices and ash deposits is burned into the
grid. The fat drips into the fire and creates carcinogenic substances,” Weinfurtner explains. “I wanted to develop a gourmet barbeque without all these negative aspects.” The Kugelblitz achieves this because the food is grilled indirectly on a flat steel surface above the firepit. In order for young and old to come together around the fire, safety plays a major role. That’s why the Kugelblitz is constructed with an outer wall air-cooling-system, and you can touch the outer wall without hesitation. In addition, it doesn’t have to be stored inside if the weather changes and it looks like a timeless piece of art, perfectly integrated into the garden landscape. For Weinfurtner, every Kugelblitz has a soul. Hundreds of hours of manual craftsmanship and passion go into its production. “It’s always a special moment when we can deliver a Kugelblitz personally and set it up for our customers,” he concludes with a smile. www.kugelblitz.bayern