Activa

Origins and background

Activa is a German outdoor-cooking and barbecue brand based in Hof, Bavaria, run by ACTIVA Grillküche GmbH. The company started around the year 2000 as Schleicher-Grill and took on the ACTIVA name in 2007. Its range spans gas, charcoal and electric grills, smokers, patio heaters and grilling accessories, with a clear focus on functional, value-priced kit.

The product we carry

From that range, at mikamado we've selected the Activa Power-Lighter, an electric hot-air fire starter. The idea is simple and genuinely handy: instead of chemical cubes or lighter fluid, it blasts a jet of superheated air that gets charcoal or briquettes glowing in a few minutes, with no fumes and no off-flavours in your food. It's the same principle behind the blower-style lighters many of us reach for to fire up a kamado.

Our take

This is an accessory you buy for usefulness, not for badge appeal. Based on its specs and on the daily ritual of lighting our own Big Green Egg Large, a hot-air starter is about as clean and fast as it gets for lump charcoal, and it sidesteps that paraffin aftertaste. The honest catch: it needs a power socket, so on a patio without an outlet it loses ground to a plain torch or a chimney starter. It competes with Looftlighter-style tools and with old-school lighting.

Who it's for

For anyone cooking over charcoal —kamado, kettle or brasero— who wants to light up fast, chemical-free and with a socket nearby. If you need to be completely off the grid, look at a chimney starter first.