When someone mentions barbecue, your mouth might just start watering. Or, maybe your mind fills with images like the backyard grill, filled with succulent cuts of meat slowly cooking over wood and smoke that adds flavor to the food. Yum!
Different cooks have different preferences and style in their cooking. Some prefer rubbing the seasoning prior to cooking and some prefer to soak the meat first in special marinades that could be brines, mops, and finishing. The preparation and ingredients for marinating may differ from region to region; the preferred wood can also differ. However, no perfect barbecue will taste as good without the perfect barbecue sauce.
Barbecue sauces can generally be categorized by what they are based on. Common examples are tomato, vinegar and mustard based sauces. To give the barbecue its distinctive taste and prevent the meat from burning easily, barbecue sauces are applied to the meat while being cooked (except tomato based barbecue sauces as it burns easier than the other kinds of sauces).
Barbecue sauce preparation can either be sweet, sour, tangy, spicy, hot, thick or thin. The varieties are almost endless — anyone can make their own versions according to their own personal preferences!
Recipes for barbecue can also be pretty carefully guarded secrets. And good barbecue sauces can be purchased at almost any store. But the only perfect barbecue sauce is the one that you can create for yourself.
Remember: whatever works for you and your family can be a great barbecue sauce. So start experimenting; that is the only way to start good cooking.
The basics of Barbecue sauces…
Tomato based barbecue sauce is the most widely used. Some say that it is the most popular. Its popularity however may be due to the simplicity of preparation and besides; tomatoes are ingredients that could easily be found. The point to remember in preparing tomato-based barbecue sauces is to cook the tomatoes very well in order for the flavor to blend with the other ingredients.
Tomato based barbecue sauces are acidic. Because of this, it has the property to break down all the flavor of other ingredients blending them with its own. But because of its propensity to burn, limit the usage of tomato-based barbecue sauce while cooking. To make it even more flavorful, prepare tomato barbecue sauces a day in advance.
Mustard based sauces are preferred in North Carolina. The mustard based barbecue sauce is great for grilling pork.
Vinegar is great meat tenderizer. It is also more acidic than tomatoes. Because of its acidic content, vinegar based sauces have a tendency to penetrate deep into the meat. To make it more flavorful, experiment mixing it with chili, cider vinegar or red pepper, sugar, and salt In addition to whatever else you prefer to add.
Remember, if your experiments don’t work out perfectly, there’s nothing wrong with enjoying a good bottled sauce from the store.
Barbecue sauces are now used in so many ways, and the original types of sauce may have departed from its traditional purpose. It now serves as a condiment that is present on almost any table, like ketchup and mustard, salt and pepper. Enjoy it!
Reputable Source News 