How to make a sand oven?

The after effect of way too many BBQs and watching endless cooking shows from Jamie Oliver, Robert Rainford and anything cooking related shows on Travel Channel, we had successfully attempted on creating a sand oven during our must have BBQ sessions each year. The whole point of creating an oven from sand is to have the 'steamed' effect on the cooking and also to get back to basic when it comes to preparing simple yet delicious outdoor cooking.

Here is how you prepare a successful sand oven:

1. Your location for the sand oven should and obviously be right on the beach where there is endless supply of the sand.

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2. Simply dig a little hole out of the sand to prepare the oven. Nothing too deep or too shallow. For digging purposes, have a tiny spade handy.
3. Charcoals and some fire starter to make the fire for your oven. Once your charcoals have started to burn and formed into 'bara api', dunno what you call this in English, it's pretty much ready to be tossed into the hole you've dug earlier.

[caption id="attachment_515" align="aligncenter" width="150" caption="Charcoal inside the hole"][/caption]

We always lit up the charcoals from the BBQ set first and later move some of it into the sand hole because by doing that, we can have two sets of burning coals. One on the BBQ set and the other on the sand oven. Also, I think if you are to lit up the charcoals straight from the sand hole, it's going to be a pretty tough thing to do because the sand tend to be rather moist the further down it is below. However, I think it's still possible to lit the coal straight from the sand hole.

[caption id="attachment_516" align="aligncenter" width="150" caption="Burning charcoal in the bbq set"][/caption]

4. Once you have layered the ground of the sand hole completely with your burning charcoals, put directly whatever you want to be cooked on the burning charcoals. In our case, we usually put a huge fish like the Seabass (Siakap in Malay), lightly seasoned it with salt, pepper,spices,lemon, or whatever you want on it and nicely double wrap it on an aluminum foil.
5. Next add more burning charcoal on top of your foil to have a double top and bottom cooking effect.

[caption id="attachment_520" align="aligncenter" width="150" caption="Covering top layer with more charcoal"][/caption]

6. Lastly, cover up the final layer with sand. Make sure you fully covered the sand hole in order for the steam to remain within the hole and create the oven effect that you are looking for.
7. After a good 30 minutes, your fish should be ready to eat and dig the hole up to seize your awesome meal! I suppose, it takes longer time if you have chicken or meat in your oven.

[caption id="attachment_517" align="aligncenter" width="150" caption="Lifting up the fish in the foil using a tiny machete and tiny 'cangkul'"]

Digging out your 'oven cooked' fish

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8. The cooking result from this sand oven will produce really moist, juicy and succulent dish; in our case, the yummiest steamed fish we ever had! And this techniques never gets old and definitely a must try thing if you are looking for adventure, beach side, cooking. It is yet, another plus thing for any BBQ-lovers!

[caption id="attachment_518" align="aligncenter" width="150" caption="Yummy Seabass"][/caption]