I have never barbecued.
Raised in barbecue country, I’ve had my mouth, lips and tongue properly burned by concoctions so hot, you had to be careful you didn’t rub your eyes – now tearing from the heat – with fingers still sticky from peppers and tinted various shades of orange or red from scorching sauce.
I’ve survived secret sauces left to “ripen” for months in bottles on sunny windowsills, sauces so hot that they utterly destroy any possible food-fond bacteria that might otherwise wreak havoc on your gutt, a hot date, or dinner with your sweetheart’s family.
On the other hand, there is a school of thought that considers any form of grilling that is coupled with a sauce, a rub, or a marinade as – barbecue. 
This means that I have barbecued and never even knew it. Cool!
So, ye veterans of the outdoor grill as well as ye rookies who know no sauce other than A-1 or Worcestshire, prepare ye meats! Consider ye rubs! Blend those saucy salad dressings! And check this out:
Not all barbecue is red!
Some regional sauces in the south traditionally are based on mustard and vinegar and contain not a drop of red, nor a blush of scarlet. That’s right: no tomatoes, no ketchup, no tomato paste in various regional sauces from parts of northern Alabama, eastern North Carolina, and the central or low country of South Carolina.
If one took this idea and made a sauce of vinegar, mustard, garlic, salt, pepper and some oil, you’ve got the traditional French vinaigrette – an oil and vinegar salad dressing to us plebes. Alter the vinegar and the marinade – err, barbecue sauce – changes flavor in delightful ways. Basic vinegars: cider; balsamic; wine and, for a milder tweak, rice vinegar.
Old school sauce
While screamingly hot artisan sauces can be found everywhere from the verdant vines of Sonoma to the Green Mountains of Vermont, traditional hot and savory barbecue’s reputation still rests in the midwest: Kansas City style, St. Louis style and, a bit farther south, Texas style.
The old school barbecue favors either thick or thin tomato bases made interesting with vinegar, different kinds of peppers, horse radish or other assaults on the tongue as well as secret spices (cardamon? cumin? ginger?) and just a hint of something sweet like molasses or peaches or even marmalade.
Or bourbon! Yep. Memphis and various parts of Georgia kick up their sauce with bourbon. At www.epicurious.com both Gourmet and Bon Appetit have recipes for bourbon-based barbecue sauces.
Season early, sauce late, and slow is the way to go
Fine Cooking magazine says that if you want to barbecue without burning or drying out the meat into some hard-to-identify form of briquette, sauce the meat a few minutes before it is done. That’s all sauce needs to cook: minutes.
Seasoning early, however, is good as seasoning lets flavor sink in. Although barbecue rubs might count as seasoning, in my experience, any dry seasonings on grilled meats also burn. Ever put dried garlic on something under the broiler?
This really means that a non-tomato-based sauce, the old marinade, may be the way to go. Flavor sinks in and, if you are using a higher temp oil like canola rather than olive, it can take the heat. Mind you, when fat starts dripping or you’re trying that Memphis barbecue, all bets are off!
According to the July issue of Bon Appétit and Fine Cooking’s summer, 2008 special grilling publication, lower and slower cooking temps definitely are the way to go. They let in more flavor and allow for juicier end results.
Ultimately, temperature is simply a question of control: hot temperatures are harder to control. Does lower and slower mean you need two grills? A hot one and a medium-hot one? Do you need an SUV-sized grill in order to have a hot side and a less-hot side? Or does it require two stages of cooking?
For a really interesting article on what’s hot (excuse the pun) on the barbecue and grill scene, check out (online at epicurious.com) grill and barbecue meister Steve Raichlen’s article “The Best Barbecue in the USA”. He also includes barbecue tips (with good pix) and, for the history geeks like me, a history of barbecue. Cool!
Signed,
Concord Star
