Value for Money

This week Value for Money looks at charcoal barbecues

Homebase Cast Iron Ferrara II Barbecue €21.99

Highs: This comes in a surprisingly compact flat-pack so is easy to fit in a car already crammed with stuff. Its pot-bellied appearance lends it an old-fashioned feel and allows it to function as a fairly funky piece of garden furniture when not barbecuing. It looks a little more expensive than it is and lights pretty handily.

Lows: At 12kg it is very heavy for its size and is not at all portable. The nuts and bolts used to assemble it are silver coloured and stand out against the blackened iron. The grill is quite small so you won't be able to feed more than a few not-particularly hungry people with it while the charcoals stay hot.

Verdict: The heavyweight option

Star rating: ****

Weber Bar-B-Kettle €149.99

Highs: This is a fairly high-quality product and if cared for correctly and not left out in the winter rain will probably have the longest shelf life of the lot. With wheels at the base, it is the most portable of the barbies and has a substantial grill to facilitate a pretty enormous meat-fest. It has vents in the base to keep the flames burning and an aluminium ash catcher to stop barbie detritus spreading all over your garden.

Lows: This is the most expensive of the barbecues tried. It is almost impossible to control the temperature, so if you lose concentration for an instant there is a real danger you'll render an entire meal inedible.

Verdict: Fierce heat, fairly fierce price.

Star rating: ***

Argos Oil Drum Barbecue €79.99

Highs: This is a good, cheap family-sized barbecue that could keep a party going long after everyone has lost interest in the food. It has an additional shelf to keep cooked food warm without cremation. Another major plus was the ease with which it was assembled - from start to finish it took less than 15 minutes.

Lows: Which was handy because PriceWatch made the schoolboy error of assembling it indoors only to find out the stupidly wide legs wouldn't fit through an average-sized door, so it had to be taken apart and reassembled outside. Without either wheels or handles, it isn't portable, seems prone to dents and needs a lot of charcoal to get going.

Verdict: Big and easy to use.

Star rating: ***

Habitat Barbecue €50

Highs: This is nice and lightweight and very portable, so bringing it on a trip to the beach - should the weather allow it - would be no problem. The lime green lid which hooks neatly on to the side when cooking is nice and cheery and when PriceWatch bought it, a set of barbecue implements priced at €8 was included free.

Lows: It turned out that the implements in question were frustratingly difficult to use which counted against them somewhat. Assembling it was also pretty frustrating and you certainly wouldn't want to have big fingers when trying to screw in some of the nuts and bolts. And at €50 it is not cheap given what you're getting.

Verdict: Difficult and dear

Star rating: ** Tesco Disposable Three-pack Barbecue €8.95

Highs: Given our unpredictable weather this cheap and hassle-free option might be better than investing several hundred euro on a barbie only to watch it rust in the rain for the remainder of the summer. It is grand for a spontaneous barbecue. It lights with alacrity and promises to cook for 90 minutes.

Lows: When PriceWatch put a match to it, it burned a little too energetically - so be careful not to position it close to anything flammable. It cooks only a small amount of food at a time, so all three packs are required for a half decent barbecue. There isn't much of a lip on it, making it too easy for sausages to roll off into the sand.

Verdict: Very cheap and perfectly functional.

Star rating: ****