We have a 15' x 15' covered patio that I am looking to enhance with an outdoor kitchen. I'm looking into options and it looks like there are a bunch of different products out there, so I'm looking for recommendations on companies and products from this board.

I'm not looking for anything too exotic, just a straight 10-12' kitchen along the field side with grill, griddle, a small fridge, and some storage. I am also looking into a 6-8' bar to L off the post, which I think I can do with a concrete countertop and some posts. I'm hoping to keep it to $10-$12K but I'm not sure if that's really doable from what I'm asking.

It looks like one option is to just buy a pre-built island with appliances from Wayfare/HD/similar, but I'm not super sold on durability - most look like I'll have replace them in 3-5 years. I've also looked at buying the metal frames and doing the veneer/masonry myself, which I'm willing to do but I'm not sure just how much extra work I'd be signing myself up for. Another option is to go through a design process and order a kit from somewhere like RTA outdoors, which I'm guessing will be high quality but pricey. I have a couple design meetings setup with some online reps, but based on the volume and tenor of emails I've received already from them I'm guessing it's going to be like talking to a used car salesman

Any recommendations on products, companies to use or avoid, and things to think about are greatly appreciated!

For me personally the RTA system is extremely high priced for what your get and the cabinet walls, corners and countertops look cheap. Maybe I feel that way because my company builds "actual" Outdoor Kitchens and we have the sell against it. We've probably built 60-70 in the past 5 years or so. There are several ways people go about building them, each with it's pro's and con's. We have settled on framing them out of metal, then Hardie backer and then whatever veneer you choose and countertops. We use 1" square Aluminum tubing (I believe 16 gage). We just frame the cabinet using the square tube with little L brackets and self taping aluminum screws (just make sure you don't mix metals). It's pretty simple, just make sure everything is square, plum and level then skin it with the hardie backer.




DO NOT start framing it out based on your appliance manufactures rough opening recommendations. Wait till you have your appliances onsite and frame it off what you actually measure. We have been burned bad by going off the manufactures rough opening recommendations. Never assume everything is actually sized the way it's advertised, better to be adaptable than off by a 1/16th of an inch)

DO make sure to have a vent on the backside near the grill and or griddle. If propane, vent goes at the bottom of the wall, if natural gas, it goes at the top.

As far as countertops go, we don't do concrete counter tops, not because they aren't cool but because they are so much more labor intensive and could have so many little things happen that a homeowner could complain about so we just stick to granite countertops. When all is said and done (at least for us) granite comes out to about the same cost.

In terms of appliances, we generally don't supply the appliances and just install whatever our customers supply. The lowest cost manufacturer is 'Bull' and you can't go wrong with it. It's pretty good and we have not had any issues installing 'Bull' and it's certainly good enough quality. One brand I would recommend taking a hard look at is 'True Flame'. It is the in house brand for a company the manufactures a lot of different brands grills. So while it maybe 5-10% more than a similarly sized and specked Bull appliance, they feel and are built like really high-end brands. You won't find better bang for your buck than True Flame appliances. (FYI all outdoor kitchen appliances are pricey, even the cheapest ones) . When it comes to the cabinet doors and drawers - go Amazon. There is a brand called Vevor, you can just order what you want off amazon and its about a 1/3 the price of any of the name brand manufactures and it's essentially all the same stuff regardless.



Let me know if you got anymore questions.

Thank you so much! This is a wealth of information and more helpful than I could have imagined. I will have some more questions for you as I get into the design phase