What, exactly, constitutes barbecue sauce? As with just about everything else about barbecue, this is a contentious topic: depending upon regional tastes, barbecue sauce can range from thin and vinegary to gloopy and molasses-like. (It can even, for reasons that defy human comprehension, .) But on a basic level, it ought to strike some sort of balance between tangy, sweet, and smoky.
It's one thing to know what makes a good barbecue sauce. The fun part is figuring out your preferred way of striking the balance. Do you use a bit of mustard to add a little more tang? Or do you and stir in some Peach Pepsi to lend your sauce a fruity, caramel-esque flavor? You can experiment as much as you'd like, tinkering away in your kitchen like some kind of mad scientist pitmaster.
But if you'd like a bit of direction, try gelling with some jelly. Why Jelly Works So Well in Barbecue Sauce This is a great way of differentiating your barbecue sauce from the kind you buy from the supermarket. Most commercially available sauces are tomato-based and flavored with sugar, molasses and vinegar (or, in the case of the bottled stuff, copious amounts of high fructose corn syrup).
This has created a sort of standardization of barbecue sauce, which is quite handy for places like McDonald's who just want to give their customers a quick idea of what they're dipping their nuggets into. But those who want a little something more can make it themselves — and maybe even do it better. The same qualities that.