How to Build a Barbecue Sauce

About this Recipe

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By: Rachel

When I was 19, I spent a summer working in France as an au pair. I was eager to try the local specialties: crunchy baguettes with pillowy interiors; creamy quiches, cloudlike soufflés, duck à l’orange… Even as a teenager, I loved to cook, but I was sure that my skills would not be up to snuff in a real French kitchen.

My hosts were refined and sophisticated. They knew so much more than Teenage Rachel did: like how to perfectly pair wines from their wine cellar with each meal, how to debone a rabbit, and what Coquilles St. Jacques were [unrefined editor’s note: they’re scallops!]. 

They instructed me on how to make baby food for their 18-month-old son (essentially, purée whatever the rest of the family was eating with a little hot water). On my first night, I threw some steamed zucchini, rice, and salmon into the food processor, whizzed it until smooth, and airplane-d it into the expectant toddler’s mouth. 

The little boy tasted it, made a sound akin to a dying animal, turned his head, and refused to eat another bite. I checked in with the child’s mother, who rolled her eyes in my direction. “Did you add butter and crème fraȋche to it?” she inquired, as if this were the most obvious thing in the world. Embarrassed, I hurried down to the kitchen to enrich the young gourmand’s dinner with the necessary upgrades, upon which he consumed the rest of the meal without complaint, giving me a healthy side-eye for the next week’s worth of meals. 

So when my hosts said they wanted to ask me a culinary question, I swallowed hard, hoping I wouldn’t say something ridiculous.

I looked into their eager faces as they asked, “Do you know how to make . . . barbecue sauce?” They had spent time in the American South and, apparently, they wanted nothing more than to gnaw, caveman-style, on chicken legs slathered in thick barbecue sauce. (Could anyone really blame them?) So much for Coquilles St. Jacques. 

I had to admit: I did not. In fact, I’d never even thought about it before. Barbecue sauce wasn’t something you made . . . right? It was something you bought, bottled, in the grocery store. You could grab some Sweet Baby Ray’s and be happily chowing down less than an hour later. 

Barbecue sauce has a long and storied history, and more versions of it than one could count. Different sauces are unique to various regions, and most recipes are jealously guarded by their makers. 

According to the Tasting Table, barbecue sauce was first documented in 1698, when cooks in the French West Indies were observed barbecuing meat with citrus and hot peppers—suggesting that this sauce may have its roots in Africa. By the 1800s, sauces featuring ingredients like vinegar and mustard were popular throughout the American South.

A great barbecue sauce keeps us coming back for more because it is multi-dimensional—hot, sweet, tangy, smoky . . . the layered flavors combined with juicy meat is absolutely irresistible. For all its complexity, though, barbecue sauce really isn’t hard to make. You just have to keep adding a little of this and a little of that, tasting until you’re happy with it. Don’t be surprised if it takes you a while to create your perfect recipe—many pitmasters have been perfecting their secret sauces for generations!

I have created a chart to give you ideas on what you could add to your barbecue sauce, but this list is certainly not exhaustive. Use whatever ingredients you like, in whatever combinations you like. 

Much like butter or crème fraȋche, barbecue sauce is one of those staples that provides a perfect complement to a great meal. 

Guide To Building a Barbecue Sauce

Choose as many ingredients from as many columns as you like to build your signature sauce.