Have you ever wondered how people learn how to make their own BBQ sauces? Well it’s from this book. Ok, that’s a little overstated, but Paul Kirk's Championship Barbecue Sauces
is truly a primer for learning to make your own sauces. It’ll help you learn to use those spices in your spice rack that you’ve wondered what they’re good for.
For starters it has recipes for over 175 sauces, marinades, dry rubs, wet rubs, mops and salsas. These alone make the book worth owning, but for the aspiring backyard chef it has several chapters on how to use the basic ingredients, flavor profiles for spices, BBQ sauce building blocks and the entire book is littered with great rules/hints that help you understand the art of making your own barbecue sauce.
Now, this book just isn’t written by some schlub that grabbed a bunch of recipes and slapped it together. The author, Paul Kirk, has won over 400 barbecue awards including 7 world championships. He’s the real deal. I've had this book on my shelf for a few years and still love it.
This revisit will cover one of my favorite sauces that takes the Smoked Thanksgiving Turkey to a whole new level. It’s the Cranberry Pineapple Barbecue Sauce from page 203. This sauce has forever replaced that lifeless dish of jellied cranberries at our Thanksgiving dinner. Besides, what is a turkey off the barbecue without some barbecue sauce?
Recipe
Yield: 4 cups
Prep time: 5 minutes
Cooking time: 40 minutes
Ingredients
2 tablespoons of vegetable or olive oil
1/2 cup minced onions (sweet yellow or red)
1 garlic clove, pressed
1 14 to 16-ounce can cranberry sauce with whole cranberries (I prefer Ocean Spray)
1 8-ounce can crushed pineapple
1 cup ketchup (store-bought or homemade, book has recipe)
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup white vinegar
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp white pepper
1 tsp salt
Start off by heating the oil over medium heat in a large non-reactive saucepan. Add the diced onions and garlic and cook till translucent (about 4 minutes). Add everything else to the pan and let simmer for 30 to 40 minutes. Stir occasionally. This sauce is great in place of gravy and in sandwiches for leftovers.
Another great thing about the book is it tells you all the uses or meats the sauce is great with. This one in particular is great with “any kind of pork or poultry – served warm or cold”.
So if you're wanting to learn to make your own signature barbecue sauce, or how to make a dry rub or what marinade you should throw on that pork shoulder then this book is for you. Given the price I'm seeing while writing this recipe I'm going to order myself a few copies to give as Christmas gifts.