Ultimate BBQ Sauce Showdown - Triple Tested #3 (Steemit Exclusive)
Ultimate BBQ Sauce Showdown - Triple Tested #3
My fellow Steemians,
It can be finger smackin’ good or it can drown your dinner in disappointment.
Barbecue sauce.
There is no shortage of these recipes if you look on the internet. I decided to see how one sauce recipe stands up to another. I chose three recipes from my first page of search results and that all required simmering before using the final product. There was a lot of the ingredients you would expect when making a barbecue sauce — ketchup, vinegar and brown sugar. But there were also some ingredients that I found refreshing and different — fresh garlic, lemon juice and paprika.
The Contenders
Recipe #1 - Irene’s Barbeque Sauce
http://allrecipes.com/recipe/19626/irenes-barbeque-sauce/?internalSource=amp&referringContentType=amp%20recipe&clickId=amp_directions
Recipe #2 - Neely’s BBQ Sauce
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/neelys-bbq-sauce-recipe-1937392
Recipe #3 - Basic Barbecue Sauce
https://www.chowhound.com/recipes/basic-barbecue-sauce-27513
Preparing each of these recipes was very straight forward. It was mostly pouring ingredients out of bottles and jars into pots and simmering. When it came to taste each sauce was taste tested on shredded white meat chicken. Let’s see how each recipe sized up.
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This sauce concerned me because it calls for an unusual ingredient — a whole onion, sliced. The onion is simmered with the spices, vinegar, lemon juice and water. After it’s simmered you add the ketchup, worcestershire and liquid smoke. Yes, liquid smoke. For the record, I used hickory. You don’t cook it for long after adding these ingredients. It came out very thin and watery. I was surprised. It wasn’t appealing looking at all. So this sauce gets no points for texture but how did it taste? Not good. It was very one dimensional. All I tasted was the liquid smoke. With a vinegary aftertaste. With slices of onion. I was hoping for more complexity and flavour.
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This recipe was more conventional. It came out thicker, how one might expect their barbecue cause to be. This sauce had a tang that hung on paired with a light sweet. But if I had to describe how this sauce tastes in one word it would have to be peppery. Ground black pepper is one of the three spices in this sauce and it’s the only one that comes through. If you like your meat seasoned with pepper this might be the sauce for you.
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Just like recipe #2 this sauce had a nice, thick consistency. Unlike both recipes previous this one had a complex, robust flavour. It wasn’t just one flavour coming through. The ingredients married to get a rich flavoured sauce with a nice vinegary tang. This solid flavour profile could be due to the fresh garlic in the sauce. Just sayin’.
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Recipe #3 was the runaway favourite. It got the texture right as well as its rich flavour. It was absolutely delicious on my chicken and would work well with beef or pork as well.
What of the three recipes looked best to you? What other foods would you use these sauces on? Let us know in the comments below!
Written by Robin Luis with Photography by Shane Luis