Garden gadgets

Bare grills, lawn enforcers, al-fresco entertaining and ways to spot a hungry robin – let’s hear it for the tech that helps make your garden more than just somewhere to go for a sneaky fag

Tech can help you transform that bleak wasteland into a miniature Bbq-friendly Eden

WEBER GENESIS II EX-315

Some people think a barbecue isn’t really a barbecue unless you forage for the charcoal at your nearest petrol station forecourt, hunt down the meat on the wild plains of your local high street, and get it going with nothing more than a box of Swan Vestas and enough firelighters to ignite a bathful of mayonnaise – but apparently using gas is cheating.

To be honest, the LPG that powers the EX-315 Smart Barbecue’s three stainless steel burners is probably the least techy thing about it, which doesn’t bode well for the purists, but leaves the rest of us plenty of room to admire this absolute cathedral to outdoor cooking.

We’ll meat again

As well as gas, the EX-315 is cooking with Wi-fi, which means you can keep an eye on whatever’s sizzling away without having to stand over its porcelain-enamelled, cast-iron cooking grates… or even open the lid. It comes with an integrated meat probe (plus the capacity to add a second one) and works with Weber’s Connect platform, which allows you to use an app on your phone to monitor temperature and cooking progress.

It’ll even send you notifications when it’s time to serve your steaks or pull your pork.

For those who prefer to do things the old-fashioned way, there’s also a built-in temperature display on the front, plus an LED handle light and illuminated control knobs in case you get peckish after dark and decide to fire it up for a midnight burger.

Sure, doing everything properly from scratch might be more authentic, but since when did stomachs care about authenticity?