British BBQ Society Forums

I was just starting over again with sauces and thought I would ask the question of what in general judges look for in sauce. I have spoke to Al after the May comp and his help was great with this but did stress that was his opinion so how much for instance does colour and texture have an influence? Also a lot of sauce recipes start with ketchup and I can't stand the taste, but would a judge feel the same way?
Thanks for the help.
This feedback section is a great idea btw

Hi

Again this is just my personal preference ....

Texture should be very slightly thinner than ketchup, flavour ... I absolutely cannot stand liquid smoke, it ruins the flavour and makes it bitter ... one of the sauces I tasted last time was so thick it formed a skin ... it was like jam ... again unpleasant!!

A good sauce should have a great depth of flavour, I prefer tomato base ... but some sauces I have tasted taste like pasta sauce (not pleasant), there should be a little chilli warmth, but not mind blowing!!!

Colour ... not really bothered about the colour as long as it looks good ... too dark usually doesn't look good by the way!!

Oh and remember ... we are tasting the sauce on its own ... from a spoon or with a cracker ... so we are not going to have the benefit of how it tastes when mixed with meat juices.

Hope that helps ... but again, I stress that this is just my personal preference.

That helps a lot thankyou. Any thoughts on ketchup based sauces?

esselle wrote:That helps a lot thankyou. Any thoughts on ketchup based sauces?

Most of the sauces out there are ketchup based, nothing wrong with using it

With regard to texture, how do you feel if there's a corser texture to the sauce. For instance I've used recipes that use onions, peppers, fruit etc, that are cooked as part of the sauce then the final product is blended.

Even when blended extremely thoroughly, you get a coarser texture than if you did a sauce that was just ketchup, vinegar, sugar, molasses and spices.

Personally I prefer sauces that are made with fresh ingredients, but I also like my sauces thicker than you are suggesting and my competition scores reflect this

I'd love to hear your opinion

Again, just my opinion .... yes fresh ingredients in a sauce are great ... but maybe sieve it afterwards to make it smooth. Also you should be able to brush a good bbq sauce onto meat, if yours is too thick it won't work, therefore in my opinion too thick is not a great idea.

Finally, cloyingly sweet sauces are not nice either, a good bbq sauce should be a finishing glaze that gets sticky when put back into the bbq for a few minutes after brushing and adds that finishing flavour but doesn't overpower the meat or the delicate smoke flavour.

This is good feedback to get!!!!

You see I prefer a thick sauce because I always cut sauces when cooking with them. If you take Blues Hog or Blue Collar (my favourite bought sauces) they're really thick but if you cut them with beer or apple juice they are great for saucing meat.

I usually cook my sauces to a similar thick consistency, serve them warmed on the side and cut them for cooking. For eating, that's how I roll and I'm not going to change However for competition entries I know to serve a thinner sauce now.

I've got a new sauce in the works, that I wasn't happy with before the competition but I think with a recent addition of Jim Beam has now become a nice product. I use a lot of fresh ingredients in it and blend it though, so I think I'm going to need to sieve it for competition, it's pretty smooth as it is but not quite smooth enough.

Competition BBQ sauce is most definately my nemesis though. I've got a few sauces that just get demolished when I serve them up for people to eat but they never do anything at competition

My sauce thoughts.

My sauce tastes acidic (Thanks major ketchup brand) if not on meat, so the cooking process get rid of this, I then started to cook the sauce for 15-20 mins this then becomes tasty as a dip or on its own.

2 sauces for comp will be my next approach.

No more liquid smoke! Blagh.

Tom

Is a sweet sauce better than a hot one or should I try and balance the two?

Definately need to balance the two ... sauce needs a depth of flavour, starting a little salty/sweet (rather than cloying and sugary) but with that little kick that makes your mouth gently tingle afterwards ....