bbq _____________

- no picture... no clever title... so lame *hangs head in shame* yet so tasty!

it's been some time since i made bbq sauce from scratch. a shamefully long time really, so last week, or was it two weeks ago?  eh, who knows *shrug*. i made sure (or so i thought) i had everything when i went to the grocery store and that saturday, went to town. the daughter wanted to help, sure thing li'l lady. she was all excited. love it!

if you've been paying attention, you know by now that if you expect quantities you'll be disappointed... I tried and tried to come up with some approximations, but it just wasn't working. the general method to the madness goes like this:

1. start w/ enough ketchup to make the amt of sauce you want
2. add flavors that you like in quantities you think you'll like them
3. stir
4. taste
5. adjust

the beauty of the lack of measurement is that hey you can make it what you want, as sweet or as tangy or as whatever, just by tasting it and adding a li'l more this or that as you see fit. the beauty of this 'recipe' is that if you don't have all of them, no worries, the sauce will just have a different sort of vibe. the last time i made it, i didn't have onions or worcestershire, but it's still delish.

sauce ingredients

• ketchup 
• spicy mustard 
• soy sauce 
• lemon juice (fresh is ideal of course, but real lemon does the trick as well)
• garlic (either powder, minced (jar or fresh), they all work)
• onion (either powder, or fresh)
• worcestershire sauce
• honey
• brown sugar (light or dark works taste wise, dark will give you a darker color of course)
• apple cider vinegar

mix it all up

i typically make it on the stove on med/low heat. if you're going to end up cooking the meat in the sauce, you wouldn't necessarily need to. If you're going to end up just putting it as is on something cooked, I'd recommend it, just to make sure the sugar's all dissolved and all the various liquids come together. i'm no super culinarian so I don't actually KNOW that the heat is necessary to make that happen, but i'm ok w/ the logic and hey, it can't hurt it.

on the meat 

lately i only season the meat itself w/ salt and pepper and then don't put it in the sauce. also, this go around i also added mccormick smokehouse maple grill mate to the meat itself. added a smokey maple-y-ness to the final product. necessary? not at all, they didn't always make those, ya know. and this is a long standing 'recipe'  *grin*

And that's about it. use it in a pan... in a pot... on a grill... in a crock... whatever you're pleasure. when i made the bbq chicken, i cooked the chicken and then added the sauce and let it simmer in the sauce for a li'l bit before dinner. when i made ribs just yesterday, i added a li'l bit just to cover the meat when i put it in the crock (2 racks, maybe abt 2 lbs or so, hi for abt 4.5 hrs). then when they were done, i took them out of the crock, put them in  a cake pan, covered them w/ the rest of the sauce. I SHOULD have cut the ribs first THEN  poured the sauce over it, but it all worked out anyway. DEEE ELISH!