Baking homestyle bread rolls using homegrown wheat cooked with homemade charcoal at Kisima Farm, Timau.

Baking stone ground whole wheat fresh Kisima bread rolls and bread at the Kisima Petrol station just past Timau.  All of the charcoal used in the oven is made from pruned branches of trees grown on the farm. This means that their energy cost is so low these delicious bread rolls are only 10bob each! They make and sell more then 200 a day and in total per day use a bit less then the box of charcoal in the picture.

letting the bread rolls rise.

the Kisima stone ground all natural flour.

The Large Cookswell Charcoal oven - only 38,000ksh

Sirikoi Camp, Lewa Downs, 100% off-grid renewable biomass energy system for cooking and heating.

Sirikoi Camp in Lewa Downs currently has the best fully working sustainable domestic biomass energy production and use systems in all of Northern Kenya.
They use a Kinyanjui barrel kiln to carbonize sustainably pruned and harvested (and sometimes branches stripped by passing elephants!) twigs and branches from their own yellow fever tree's and use this high quality lumpwood charcoal to power the camps Cookswell charcoal ovens and space heaters.

The colliers with their new kiln and a KCJ

A large and a medium 4 level oven.

The most delicious teatime treats baked at camp using the neighbors locally grown wheat and Sirikoi's own homegrown charcoal.

The Kinyanjui barrel kiln that uses only twigs and branches to make the charcoal needed for the camps cooking.

The 7,000ksh Safari special mini-charcoal oven - Ngong Hills.

 

Enjoy a simple delicious bbq anywhere with this mini-safari charcoal convection oven. And use less then 1kg of charcoal to cook for 8 hungry people! 

 

Cook while you drive and arrive with a ready lunch!

The Mini-Cookswell oven aka. "the bachelors buddy' @9,000ksh

Fill up the jiko and put toss it in the back of a pick up and cook while you drive!
Stop to check every 30-45min and have some bitings.

Breakfast for 4 people using only 10ksh worth of charcoal.

                                  

Cook while you drive ~ stopping for bitings on the Naivasha road.

Simple, Sustainable, Eco-'Branch' Charcoal Solutions

 On June 9th, The Woodlands 2000 Trust and Cookswell Jikos held a day long demonstration course in sustainable charcoal making for the Carnivore Restaurant. This method uses the Kinyanjui Barrel Kiln to carbonize small branches and twigs rotationally pruned from trees that coppice well.  

The two kilns (each at 14,000ksh) and a pile of the feedstock; tree branches.

The best Kenyan 'nyama choma' is always cooked on charcoal, just ask the Carnivore!

Topping up the kiln and controlling the air flow with the air intakes.

Mr. Lanius, from the Wildlife Works REDD program participating in some hands on charcoal making training.

Sealing down the kiln prior to the 7hr cooling phase.

Excellent lumpwood charcoal made with very little fuss and effort. No axe's, chainsaws, earth kilns, briquetting machines and drying racks.....just a 400ksh machete and a Kinyanjui Barrel Kiln.

The Kimana Woodfuel Conservation Center

A tree sedling nursery by Go-Green Nysiti

The first cakes ever baked for sale in Kimana town!

20bob per queen cake!

All done after an easy day of baking with a cookswell!

A charcoal oven is an excellant piece of technology for bakeries in Kenya today. Due to the high cost of imported fossil fuels (LGP gas) and the raising cost and unreliability of electricity, a charcoal oven is an excellent choice for baking in Kenya. And they are fully portable and can come with a water heating tank which is very useful for cleaning and for raising certain breads faster.
All ovens are powered by regular charcoal that you can buy anywhere in Kenya, or if you want, charocal briquettes. The oven has doors for controlling the heat so you can regulate it depending on what you are cooking, no-mess ashtrays, skid-free rubber feet and is insulated all over for maximum energy efficiency.
Your oven also comes with 1 packet of acacia tree seeds so that you can plant a future source of charcoal for cooking with.

The small 3 level charcoal oven baking carrot cake at the Lower Kabete Woodenergy Resource Center - Farasi Lane, Nairobi.

Some of the energy saving stoves and ovens at the Resource Center- We have tree seedlings, tree seeds and improved charcoal branch kilns available too.

baking carrot cake using only a handful of home made charcoal

perfect for a cold Nairobi morning.

let the cakes cool and then....

Enjoy!