About Barbecue Sauce
When someone mentions barbecue, many people have the image of a summer social gatherings, grilling in the backyard, cooking outdoors as well as slowly cooking meat over wood or smoke that adds flavor to food. It also reminds people of the summer season with all it's glory with the smell of charcoal and meat wafting through the warm breezes.
It is safe to assume that different cooks have different styles and preferences in their cooking. While some prefer to soak their food in marinades before grilling, others prefer rubbing the seasoning whether wet or dry prior to cooking. Marinating ingredients, as well as preparation, also varies from region to region as well as the choice of wood used.
Barbecue sauces can usually be categorized on what the sauce itself is based on; vinegar, mustard and tomato based sauces are common examples. Sauces are commonly added to the meat while it is cooking in order to give it a distinctive taste as well as preventing the meat from burning easily. However, tomato based sauces are the exception due to the fact that these kinds of sauces burn easier than the others.
Barbecue sauces have a variety of tastes as well as thickness and these might include sweet, spicy, tangy, sour thick or thin. Even though you can purchase a bottle of barbecue sauce at the store, you can add your own touch to your meat when you prepare the sauce yourself.
The most widely used and perhaps the most popular barbecue sauce is tomato based. It is easy to prepare and the ingredients can be easily found. When preparing a tomato based sauce, be sure to cook the tomatoes very well in order for the flavor to blend with the other ingredients. Because these sauces are acidic in nature, tomato based sauces contain the property to breakdown the flavor of the other ingredients while blending them with its own.
Mustard based barbecue sauces are less common than the tomato based sauces. A favorite in North Carolina, these thick yellow (sometimes orange) sauces are great for grilling pork as well as dipping.
Barbecue sauces that are vinegar based are not only more acidic than tomatoes in nature, they also make great meat tenderizers. These sauces have a tendency to penetrate deep into the meat and can be made more flavorful by adding several ingredients to it. Among these ingredients include chili,sugar,salt,red pepper,or cider vinegar and other ingredients that you desire in your sauce.
The use of barbecue sauce has grown in variety since it's original use and also serves as a condiment. If you are not comfortable with making your own barbecue sauce yet, you can easily find it at your local grocery store. However, keep in mind that in order to make great barbecue, be sure that you do not put too much importance on the "with smoke flavor" label on many bottled tomato sauces. The smoke flavor you are looking for comes from the wood in which you smoke the meat.