Barbecue Sauce Quotes

What are you talking about? Are you for real? (Nick) What do you mean? The Simi’s not turning invisible again, is she? Ooo, that would be bad. I promised akri I wouldn’t do that no more in public places. But sometimes the Simi can’t help it. Kind of like putting barbecue sauce on salads. It’s just mandatory and reflexive ‘cause you gots to kill the taste of the ick rabbit food. (Simi)

The Simi gots some barbecue sauce in her bag. It kind of looks like blood if you squint at it the right way. And it don’t coagulate between your teeth like blood or give you them funky burps, not to mention it tastes a lot better too. Especially over that type A stuff. Bleh! I’d rather eat my shoes. But that O-flavored blood…yum! (She straightened and held one finger up in a gesture that strangely reminded him of Smokey the Bear.) And just remember, kids, three out of four demons all prefer barbecue sauce over hemoglobin. (Simi)

You ever wonder when god's coming back with a lot of barbecue sauce?

(The baby sneezed. Wulf jumped as fire shot out of its nostrils and almost singed his leg.) Excuse me. I almost made Dark-Hunter barbecue, which would be really sad ‘cause I ain’t got no barbecue sauce with me. (Simi)

Daddy had a strict rule about firearms. Anything we killed we had to eat. No amount of barbecue sauce would make a hairy guy like you palatable.

Ooo, let’s see, I need to get my spicy barbecue sauce. Definitely some oven mitts, ‘cause he’s gonna be hot from being flame-broiled. I need to get a couple of them apple trees to make wood chips so the meat be nice and appley tasting. Give it that extra yumminess, ‘cause I don’t like that Daimon flavor. Ack! (Simi)

Do you like kids? Only with barbecue sauce.

And just remember, kids, three out of four demons all prefer barbecue sauce over hemoglobin." (Simi)

No, but it’s what I need to know the answer to. (Sin) Yes, Sin. I missed you. I’ve mourned for you. I’ve hated you. I’ve wanted to sic Simi on you with barbecue sauce and I’ve done nothing but think about how much I just want to hold you…and yes, I’ve missed every part of you, from that annoying little sound you make when you’re irritated to the way you hold me when we sleep. Now are you happy? (Kat) I’m delirious. (Sin)

You are such an optimist. My Spidey-sense is tingling all over the place. (Tory) That’s from eating the ice cream. Relax. (Acheron) Relax. Trust me. It’ll be all right. Isn’t that how I ended up dead? (Danger) Stop feeding her anxiety. (Acheron) Anxiety. The Simi’s never eaten that before. Is that tasty? (Simi) Not really. (Danger) Oh. Maybe we should put barbecue sauce on it. Everything’s better with barbecue. (Simi)

He darted a guilty look toward his dad. “Will you—get me a bottle of spicy?” My eyes jerked to his. “Maybe some barbecue sauce?” I closed my mouth before a bug flew into it. “Sure.” I did not believe this. I was pimping ketchup to the son of the FIB’s captain.

All I need is some barbecue sauce,” he said aloud, grease dripping down his chin. “And a Coke . . .” When

All I need is some barbecue sauce,” he said aloud, grease dripping down his chin. “And a Coke . . .

Let’s say you have an ax. Just a cheap one, from Home Depot. On one bitter winter day, you use said ax to behead a man. Don’t worry, the man was already dead. Or maybe you should worry, because you’re the one who shot him. He had been a big, twitchy guy with veiny skin stretched over swollen biceps, a tattoo of a swastika on his tongue. Teeth filed into razor-sharp fangs-you know the type. And you’re chopping off his head because, even with eight bullet holes in him, you’re pretty sure he’s about to spring back to his feet and eat the look of terror right off your face. On the follow-through of the last swing, though, the handle of the ax snaps in a spray of splinters. You now have a broken ax. So, after a long night of looking for a place to dump the man and his head, you take a trip into town with your ax. You go to the hardware store, explaining away the dark reddish stains on the broken handle as barbecue sauce. You walk out with a brand-new handle for your ax. The repaired ax sits undisturbed in your garage until the spring when, on one rainy morning, you find in your kitchen a creature that appears to be a foot-long slug with a bulging egg sac on its tail. Its jaws bite one of your forks in half with what seems like very little effort. You grab your trusty ax and chop the thing into several pieces. On the last blow, however, the ax strikes a metal leg of the overturned kitchen table and chips out a notch right in the middle of the blade. Of course, a chipped head means yet another trip to the hardware store. They sell you a brand-new head for your ax. As soon as you get home, you meet the reanimated body of the guy you beheaded earlier. He’s also got a new head, stitched on with what looks like plastic weed-trimmer line, and it’s wearing that unique expression of “you’re the man who killed me last winter” resentment that one so rarely encounters in everyday life. You brandish your ax. The guy takes a long look at the weapon with his squishy, rotting eyes and in a gargly voice he screams, “That’s the same ax that beheaded me!” IS HE RIGHT?

Centuries ago, sailors on long voyages used to leave a pair of pigs on every deserted island. Or they'd leave a pair of goats. Either way, on any future visit, the island would be a source of meat. These islands, they were pristine. These were home to breeds of birds with no natural predators. Breeds of birds that lived nowhere else on earth. The plants there, without enemies they evolved without thorns or poisons. Without predators and enemies, these islands, they were paradise. The sailors, the next time they visited these islands, the only things still there would be herds of goats or pigs. Oyster is telling this story. The sailors called this "seeding meat." Oyster says, "Does this remind you of anything? Maybe the ol' Adam and Eve story?" Looking out the car window, he says, "You ever wonder when God's coming back with a lot of barbecue sauce?

Think of the beginning of the story of the beginning of everything: Adam (without Eve and without divine guidance) names the animals. Continuing his work, we call stupid people bird-brained, cowardly people chickens, fools turkeys. Are these the best names we have to offer? If we can revise the notion of women coming from a rib, can’t we revise our categorizations of the animals that, draped with barbecue sauce, end up as the ribs on our dinner plates — or for that matter, the KFC in our hands?

Centuries ago, sailors on long voyages used to leave a pair of pigs on every deserted island. Or they'd leave a pair of goats. Either way, on any future visit, the island would be a source of meat. These islands, they were pristine. These were home to breeds of birds with no natural predators. Breeds of birds that lived nowhere else on earth. The plants there, without enemies they evolved without thorns or poisons. Without predators and enemies, these islands, they were paradise. The sailors, the next time they visited these islands, the only things still there would be herds of goats or pigs. .... Does this remind you of anything? Maybe the ol' Adam and Eve story? .... You ever wonder when God's coming back with a lot of barbecue sauce?

On the barbecue pit, chickens and spareribs sputtered in their own fat and a sauce whose recipe was guarded in the family like a scandalous affair.

(Remember: There’s no such thing as a mistake in the kitchen, just a new recipe waiting to be discovered!)

Texas barbecue is so good, you don’t need barbecue sauce, and some places don’t bother to serve it, believing that it distracts from the exquisite flavors.

I don’t know why, but the thought of a woman marinating makes me think of her tied up in a bathtub filled with barbecue sauce. With a Lord, anything is possible.

What are you doing on my bed?” I ask. His eyes, always full of sharp intelligence, take in my sauce-covered dress and the blush still lingering on my cheeks. “What are you doing covered in barbecue?

Honey, have you seen my measuring tape?” “I think it’s in that drawer in the kitchen with the scissors, matches, bobby pins, Scotch tape, nail clippers, barbecue tongs, garlic press, extra buttons, old birthday cards, soy sauce packets thick rubber bands, stack of Christmas napkins, stained take-out menus, old cell-phone chargers, instruction booklet for the VCR, some assorted nickels, an incomplete deck of cards, extra chain links for a watch, a half-finished pack of cough drops, a Scrabble piece I found while vacuuming, dead batteries we aren’t fully sure are dead yet, a couple screws in a tiny plastic bag left over from the bookshelf, that lock with the forgotten combination, a square of carefully folded aluminum foil, and expired pack of gum, a key to our old house, a toaster warranty card, phone numbers for unknown people, used birthday candles, novelty bottle openers, a barbecue lighter, and that one tiny little spoon.” “Thanks, honey.” AWESOME!

One centimeter was an opening the size of a fingertip. Two and a half centimeters were the second and third fingers, slipped into an opening the size of the neck of a bottle of nail polish remover. Four centimeters of dilation were those same fingers, spread in the neck of a forty-ounce bottle of Sweet Baby Ray’s barbecue sauce. Five centimeters

HERE IS A LIST of foods we discovered in America: Peanut butter. Marshmallows. Barbecue sauce. (You can say, “Can I have BBQ?” to a kid’s mom at potlucks and they’ll know what you mean.) Puppy chow. (Chex cereal covered in melted chocolate and peanut butter and tossed in powdered sugar. They only give it if you win a Valentine friend.) Corn-chip pie (not a pie). (Chili on top of corn chips with cheese and sour cream (not sour).) Some mores. (They say it super fast like s’mores.) Banana puddin. (They don’t say the g. Sometimes they don’t even say the b.) Here is a list of the foods from Iran that they have never heard of here: All of it. All the food. Jared Rhodes didn’t even know what a date was.

I'm not going to have a marriage of convenience with you if you're always embarrassing me with the way you eat burritos," Alex says, watching her chew. A black bean falls out of her mouth and lands on one of her keyboards. "Aren't you from Texas?" she says through her mouthful. "I've seen you shotgun a bottle of barbecue sauce. Watch yourself or I'm gonna marry June instead.

Tangy Barbecued Meatballs 2 lbs. ground beef 1 c. corn flake cereal, crushed 1/3 c. fresh parsley, chopped 2 eggs 2 T. soy sauce 1/4 t. pepper 1/2 t. garlic powder 1/3 c. catsup 2 T. dried, minced onion Combine all ingredients, mixing well. Form mixture into one-inch meatballs; place in an ungreased 13"x9" baking pan. Pour sauce over meatballs; bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Makes 15 servings. Sauce:

The remainder of the lion... was still in my freezer that spring when I happened to turn up at the Rock Creek Lodge. This bar... is regionally famous for its annual Testicle Festival, a liquor-filled carnival where ranchers, hippies, loggers, bikers, and college kids get together in September in order to get drunk, shed clothes, dance, and occasionally fight... But on this day the Testicle Festival was still a half year away, and the bar was mostly empty except for a plastic bag of hamburger buns and an electric roasting pan that was filled with chipped meat and a tangy barbecue sauce. I was well into my third sandwich... when the owner of the place came out and asked how I liked the cougar meat. ...When I left the bar, the man called after me to announce a slogan that he'd just thought of: "Rock Creek Lodge: Balls in the fall, pussy in the spring!

MAKES: 2 quarts COOKING METHOD: stove COOKING TIME: 20 minutes This is an all-purpose barbecue sauce, with a distinct garlic and tomato flavor. We have used this recipe to rave reviews at the James Beard Foundation and the American Institute of Wine and Food’s “Best Ribs in America” competition. Use it as a finishing glaze or serve it on the side as a dip for any type of barbecue. 2 TABLESPOONS OLIVE OIL ¼ CUP CHOPPED ONION 1 TEASPOON FRESH MINCED GARLIC 4 CUPS KETCHUP 1⅓ CUPS DARK BROWN SUGAR 1 CUP VINEGAR 1 CUP APPLE JUICE ¼ CUP HONEY 1½ TABLESPOONS WORCESTERSHIRE SAUCE 1½ TABLESPOONS LIQUID SMOKE 1 TEASPOON SALT 1 TEASPOON BLACK PEPPER 1 TEASPOON CAYENNE PEPPER 1 TEASPOON CELERY SEED Heat the olive oil in a large nonreactive saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and garlic and lightly sauté. Stir in the remaining ingredients and heat until the sauce bubbles and starts to steam. Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature. Transfer to a tightly covered jar or plastic container and store refrigerated for up to 2 weeks.

Alice made a simple supper of Welsh rarebit (toast points smothered in a sauce of cheddar, cream, dry mustard, and spices) with tomato slices, from Nellie's cookbook, and barbecued sausages, along with a "fluffy white cake" that turned out not to be that fluffy but was still delicious.

The hawker center was a large, open-air hall that housed four dozen independently owned food stalls, each specializing in a single signature dish, from barbecued stingray coated in fiery, pungent shrimp paste to Hokkien mee, a mixture of yellow and rice noodles, fried with eggs and then braised in rich, savory prawn stock.

I imagine what a woman might be able to smuggle into jail, given the remarkable flexibility of the female anatomy. I think about how, when I was a student nurse, I had to practice to figure out the width of a dilated cervix. One centimeter was an opening the size of a fingertip. Two and a half centimeters were the second and third fingers, slipped into an opening the size of the neck of a bottle of nail polish remover. Four centimeters of dilation were those same fingers, spread in the neck of a forty-ounce bottle of Sweet Baby Ray’s barbecue sauce. Five centimeters was the opening of a fifty-ounce Heinz ketchup bottle. Seven centimeters: a plastic shaker of Kraft Parmesan cheese.

The proper balance of sugar and salt was the key to perfect barbecue sauce. Of course, when it came to barbecue sauce, everybody had an opinion about the combination of acid, aromatics, fruit, and flavorings---the ineffable umami---that made each bite so satisfying. But Margot Salton knew with utter certainty that it all started with sugar and salt. She'd even named her signature product after it: sugar+salt. This sauce was her superpower. Her secret. Her stock-in-trade. When she'd had nothing---no home, no education, no family, no means of support---she had created the powerful alchemy of flavors that made grown men moan with pleasure, cautious women ignore their diets, and skeptical foodies beg for more.

4. THE CRUMBLING WALL (Hamburger, prepared medium well, with bacon and barbecue sauce. Courtesy of that place on Solano, where, it should be mentioned, they use much too much barbecue sauce, which anyone should know has the almost immediate effect of soaking the bun, the bun becoming like oatmeal, inedible, the burger ruined, all in a matter of minutes--so quick that even when the burger is picked up and patrons attempt to save the bun ('Separate them! Quick! Get the bun away from the sauce! Now scrape! Scrape!'), it's always too late, necessitating the keeping, at home, of a stash of replacement buns, which are then toasted, heavily, to provide maximum resistance to the sauce's degenerative effects. Served with potatoes of the French kind, and fruit, as above.

A kitten is almost too easy, I think, as I quickly pull out its fur and separate and de-bone it, and put the pieces in the blast cooker for three of the remaining four minutes, then add them to my gumbo, just as Chef Reamsy calls time. “Ladies first,” he says, as I present him with a plate. “What have we here?” “Chef, this is a Slim Jim, Chee-Tos, and kitten gumbo in a spicy Pepsi sauce,” I say. “Bon appetite.” He picks through it. “It certainly looks visually stunning,” he says. “What’d you use in the sauce?” “Pepsi, and a little K-C Masterpiece barbecue sauce. I put that in a pan and let it reduce down.” He takes a bite. “Flavorful. The meat is moist and tender, the sauce has just the right amount of spice, and I love the way you incorporated the stray kitten into the dish. Well done indeed.

How was Houston?" I asked as he set me down. Dad's warm brown eyes crinkled with his smile. "Hot. But the food was great, and I've got a lot to write about." 'What was your favorite bite?" I asked. "Savory or sweet?" he asked, grinning. "Savory first, then sweet," I said, grinning back. "Well, I had an incredible pork shoulder in a brown sugar-tamarind barbecue sauce. It was the perfect combination of sweet and sour." Dad has an amazing palate; he can tell whether the nutmeg in a soup has been freshly grated or not. "That sounds delicious. And the best dessert?" "Hands down, a piece of pecan pie. It made me think of you. I took notes- it was flavored with vanilla bean and cinnamon rum. But I bet we could make one even better." "Ooh," I said. "Maybe with five-spice powder? I think that would go really well with the sweet pecans." "That's my girl, the master of combining unusual flavors.

Early stages now, though, and he had an idea for a new recipe that just might give his line of barbecue sauces an edge over other brands. He chopped the tops off a handful of garlic bulbs, then fired up a burner on the gas stove and glugged vegetable oil into his stockpot. Cranked on the oven—hot—and set the garlic in the cast-iron skillet and drizzled on olive oil. To the pan on the stovetop, he added brown sugar and tomato sauce. Balsamic vinegar and molasses. Soon the scent of roasted garlic filled the kitchen, accompanied by the homey hiss and pop of bubbling sauce. In the zone, he envisioned the components for his new blend as clearly as if they were scribbled on the subway-tile backsplash behind the cooktop like ingredients on a handwritten recipe card. Mustard, cayenne, salt, pepper. His hands moved with muscle memory—slicing, stirring, seasoning, blending the sauce to a fine puree. The earlier sense of intrusion was evaporating along with the extra liquid in the pot.

Tonight they had been presented with a heavily spiced and scented barbecue lamb; rabbits stewed in fermented grape-juice with red peppers and whole cloves of garlic; meat-balls stuffed with brown truffles which literally melted in the mouth; a harder variety of meat-balls fried in coriander oil and served with triangular pieces of chilli-paste fried in the same oil; a large container full of bones floating in a saffron-coloured sauce; a large dish of fried rice; miniature vol-au-vents and three different salads; asparagus, a mixture of thinly sliced onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, sprinkled with herbs and the juice of fresh lemons, chick-peas soaked in yoghurt and sprinkled with pepper.

Mr. Wesley Jones’s Barbecue Mop This is my adaptation of a barbecue mop innovated by Mr. Wesley Jones, a barbecue master interviewed by the WPA, and who cooked during antebellum slavery. ½ stick butter, unsalted 1 large yellow or white onion, well chopped 2 cloves garlic, minced 1 cup apple cider vinegar ½ cup water 1 tbsp kosher salt 1 tsp coarse black pepper     1 pod long red cayenne pepper, or 1 tsp red pepper flakes 1 tsp dried rubbed sage     1 tsp dried basil leaves, or 1 tbsp minced fresh basil ½ tsp crushed coriander seed     ¼ cup dark brown sugar or 4 tbsp molasses (not blackstrap) Melt butter in a large saucepan. Add onion and garlic and sauté on medium heat until translucent. Turn heat down slightly and add vinegar, water, and the salt and spices. Allow to cook gently for about thirty minutes to an hour. To be used as a light mop sauce or glaze during the last 15 to 30 minutes of barbecuing and as a dip for cooked meat.

Home Cooking: The Comforts of Old Family Favorites." Easy. Baked macaroni and cheese with crunchy bread crumbs on top; simple mashed potatoes with no garlic and lots of cream and butter; meatloaf with sage and a sweet tomato sauce topping. Not that I experienced these things in my house growing up, but these are the foods everyone thinks of as old family favorites, only improved. If nothing else, my job is to create a dreamlike state for readers in which they feel that everything will be all right if only they find just the right recipe to bring their kids back to the table, seduce their husbands into loving them again, making their friends and neighbors envious. I'm tapping my keyboard, thinking, what else?, when it hits me like a soft thud in the chest. I want to write about my family's favorites, the strange foods that comforted us in tense moments around the dinner table. Mom's Midwestern "hot dish": layers of browned hamburger, canned vegetable soup, canned sliced potatoes, topped with canned cream of mushroom soup. I haven't tasted it in years. Her lime Jell-O salad with cottage cheese, walnuts, and canned pineapple, her potato salad with French dressing instead of mayo. I have a craving, too, for Dad's grilling marinade. "Shecret Shauce" he called it in those rare moments of levity when he'd perform the one culinary task he was willing to do. I'd lean shyly against the counter and watch as he poured ingredients into a rectangular cake pan. Vegetable oil, soy sauce, garlic powder, salt and pepper, and then he'd finish it off with the secret ingredient: a can of fruit cocktail. Somehow the sweetness of the syrup was perfect against the salty soy and the biting garlic. Everything he cooked on the grill, save hamburgers and hot dogs, first bathed in this marinade overnight in the refrigerator. Rump roasts, pork chops, chicken legs all seemed more exotic this way, and dinner guests raved at Dad's genius on the grill. They were never the wiser to the secret of his sauce because the fruit bits had been safely washed into the garbage disposal.

The classic recipes are goat, lamb, vegetable, and/or chicken biriyani. But when I was in New Orleans, at this restaurant, they served Louisiana barbecue shrimp, which was simply delicious. When I asked the waiter what was in the shrimp sauce, he rattled off a number of spices (rosemary, thyme, basil, oregano, et cetera) and so, I went with memory. I marinated the raw prawns in mashed garlic, rosemary, basil, oregano, thyme, sage, paprika, black pepper, white pepper, cayenne, and onion powder, along with a dash of Worcestershire sauce. I decided to cook the rice in the pressure cooker, added crushed cloves, cardamom, and cinnamon, and a bay leaf for a minute or so. Then I added some onions and fried until the onions became golden brown. Then went in the rice, and enough water, and I closed the pressure cooker. The rice was ready in ten minutes. In a separate pan, I sautéed the marinated prawns in butter, along with extra chopped garlic and the marinade, and added them to the cooked rice. I garnished it with chopped fresh coriander and voilà, Cajun prawn biriyani. I served it with some regular cucumber raita. Mama had been so sure that Daddy would hate prawns but I saw him clean out each one on his plate and even get a second helping. Sometimes we forget why we don't like some things and then when we try them again, we realize that we had been wrong.

It is a shame that Mama doesn't use the hundreds of other fruits and vegetables and spices available from around the world. If it isn't Indian, according to her, it isn't good. I think she stared so long at the blueberries that they shriveled. The butcher gave me three whole breasts of fresh free-range chicken. All of a sudden I have become very particular about ecological vegetables and free-range chickens. If they've petted the chicken and played with it before cutting it open for my eating pleasure, I'll be happy to purchase its body parts. Even if I have a tough time understanding this ecological nonsense, I feel better for buying carrots that were grown without chemicals, and I can't come up with a good reason to deny myself that happiness. I marinated the chicken breasts in white wine and salt and pepper for a while and then grilled them on the barbecue outside. The blueberry sauce was ridiculously simple. Fry some onions in butter, add the regular green chili, ginger, garlic, and fry a while longer. Add just a touch of tomato paste along with white wine vinegar. In the end add the blueberries. Cook until everything becomes soft. Blend in a blender. Put it in a saucepan and heat it until it bubbles. In the end because G'ma wouldn't shut up about going back right away, I added, in anger and therefore in too much quantity: cayenne pepper. I felt the sauce needed a little bite... but I think I bit off more than the others could swallow. I took the grilled chicken, cut the breasts in long slices, and poured the sauce over them. I made some regularbasmatiwith fried cardamoms and some regular tomato and onion raita.I put too much green chili in the raitaas well.

BLOKHIN’S KOREAN BARBECUED RIBS Rinse flanken-style ribs in cold water. In a separate bowl, mix soy sauce, brown sugar, rice wine, sesame oil, black pepper, and cayenne. Combine onion, garlic, pears, and ginger, and process to a smooth purée, then add to the soy mixture. Add toasted sesame seeds and a splash of water to thin. Pour marinade over ribs and toss to cover. Chill overnight, then bring to room temperature and discard marinade. Grill or broil until caramelized. Serve on lettuce leaves with ssamjang paste, pickled peppers, kimchi, cucumber salad, and steamed rice.

Grace rolled up her sleeves and joined the group in the kitchen, where Gladys, Pablo's wife, had worked all day directing many other women who kept food pouring out the front and side door, onto a long series of folding tables, all covered in checkered paper table cloths. While some of the women prepped and cooked, others did nothing but bring food out and set it on the table- Southern food with a Mexican twist, and rivers of it: fried chicken, chicken and dumplings, chicken mole, shrimp and grits, turnip greens, field peas, fried apples, fried calabaza, bread pudding, corn pudding, fried hush puppies, fried burritos, fried okra, buttermilk biscuits, black-eyed peas, butter bean succotash, pecan pie, corn bread, and, of course, apple pie, hot and fresh with sloppy big scoops of local hand-churned ice creams. As the dinner hours approached, Carter grabbed Grace out of the kitchen, and they both joined Sarah, Carter's friend, helping Sarah's father throw up a half-steel-kettle barbecue drum on the side of the house. Mesquite and pecan hardwoods were quickly set ablaze, and Dolly and the quilting ladies descended on the barbecue with a hurricane of food that went right on to the grill, whole chickens and fresh catfish and still-kicking mountain trout alongside locally-style grass-fed burgers all slathered with homemade spicy barbecue sauce. And the Lindseys, the elderly couple who owned the fields adjoining the orchard, pulled up in their pickup and started unloading ears of corn that had been recently cut. The corn was thrown on the kettle drum, too, and in minutes massive plumes of roasting savory-sweet smoke filled the air around the house. It wafted into the orchards, toward the workers who soon began pouring out of the house.

We’ll take care of the cooking, Gram, so you can relax.” When he and Cat both looked at her, Emma blushed. “Okay, fine. Sean will take care of the grilling so you can relax.” “I was counting on it. And, Sean, why don’t you sit down and help us settle on a wedding date.” “I told Emma to tell me when to be there and I’d be there.” “Nonsense. Sit down.” He’d rather be dipped in barbecue sauce and dropped in the desert, but he sat. One more week and it would be over. Then he wouldn’t have to think about Emma anymore. Not think about marrying her or having babies with her or holding her in his arms at night. He’d be gone and she’d be some funny story his brothers brought up sitting around the fire knocking back beer. “Really, Sean, are you okay?” Cat asked him, putting her hand on his arm. He realized he’d been rubbing his chest, and he forced himself to lean forward and prop his arms on the table so he wouldn’t do it again. “I’m fine. Let’s pick a date.

As they wove their way through the crowded street, they passed numerous barbecue tents, the focus of the festival, after all. Inside the tents, the barbecue sandwiches were made in an assembly line. Sauce, no sauce? Coleslaw on your sandwich? Want hush puppies in a cup with that? The sandwiches could be seen in the hands of every other person on the street, half-wrapped in foil. There were also tents selling pork rinds and boiled corn on the cob, chicken on a stick and brats, and, of course, funnel cakes.

Someone had planned a torture party that would end in the guest of honor becoming a human barbecue. They had everything but the barbecue sauce.

What is this?" Emily asked, looking in the largest Styrofoam container. There was a bunch of dry-looking chopped meat inside. "Barbecue." "This isn't barbecue," Emily said. "Barbecue is hot dogs and hamburgers on a grill." Vance laughed, which automatically made Emily smile. "Ha! Blasphemy! In North Carolina, barbecue means pork, child. Hot dogs and hamburgers on a grill- that's called, 'cooking out' around here," he explained with sudden enthusiasm. "And there are two types of North Carolina barbecue sauce-Lexington and Eastern North Carolina. Here, look." He excitedly found a container of sauce and showed her, accidentally spilling some on the table. "Lexington-style is the sweet sugar-and-tomato-based sauce, some people call it the red sauce, that you put on chopped or pulled pork shoulder. Julia's restaurant is Lexington-style. But there are plenty of Eastern North Carolina-style restaurants here. They use a thin, tart, vinegar-and-pepper based sauce. And, generally, they use the whole hog. But no matter the style, there's always hush puppies and coleslaw. And, if I'm not mistaken, those are slices of Milky Way cake. Julia makes the best Milky Way cakes." "Like the candy bar?" "Yep. The candy bars are melted and poured into the batter. It means 'Welcome.'" Emily looked over to the cake Julia had brought yesterday morning, still on the counter. "I thought an apple stack cake meant 'Welcome.'" "Any kind of cake means 'Welcome,'" he said. "Well, except for coconut cake and fried chicken when there's a death." Emily looked at him strangely. "And occasionally a broccoli casserole," he added.

But what Honey and Hickory lacked in ambiance, it made up for in flavor. Meat and potatoes, hearty and addictive, drenched in their signature smoky-sweet sauce. Which meant no one had room for dessert after filling up on Grandpa's award-winning ribs and brisket.

You own a barbecue sauce company and you’ve never smoked meat?” She whistled low. “The indecency.” He laughed. “Maybe you can teach me, when we’re partners.” “Nice try. You’re not getting your grubby novice hands on my smoker. But I could point you in the direction of a few good YouTube tutorials.” “Sounds a lot less fun than a personal demonstration.” He grinned. “Don’t be gross, Finn.” But she was smiling too.

She passed out plates loaded with her signature melt-away brisket crusted with the smoky candy of the fire, links she’d crafted in partnership with a sustainable ranch up near Point Reyes, butter-dipped smoked portobellos, and impossibly tender ribs smothered in her artisanal sauces. Her best sides were on display---cornbread, moist as pudding, from her mother’s private recipe collection, beans and greens, peppery jicama slaw, and her signature hummingbird cake for dessert.

She loved to experiment with her sauces. Everything started with sugar and salt. There was often vinegar and onions and tomatoes involved, but then she tried all kinds of ideas. A touch of bourbon, maybe. Stone-ground mustard. Chiles in adobo. Crazy stuff like a vanilla bean from Madagascar, bitter chocolate, Coca-Cola, coffee, star anise, tamarind, or Florida calamondins. She made careful recipe notes and kept track of the most popular flavors, adding her recipes to the most valuable treasure her mother had left behind---a massive file of clipped and handwritten recipes.

Even though the sauce started with the basic ingredients---sugar and salt---there were endless varieties. In Kansas City, their barbecue was known for rich, robust sauce with a reduced tomato base. There was an area of the Carolinas known as the Low Country---she didn’t know why it was called Low Country---where they favored a light yellow mustard sauce. Here in Texas, folks went for heat---from jalapeños, serranos, or even fiery ghost chilies---the kind of deep, flavorful pepper that sent the waitstaff at Cubby’s scurrying for pitchers of beer and sweet tea by the gallon.

It was the kind of feast she loved to fix. She made her falling-apart-tender ribs, smoked on the way-too-fancy patio barbecue and finished in a slow oven. She prepared three kinds of sauce and her very best sides---homemade cornbread with pepper jelly, plates of slow-simmered greens in pot liquor, and a salad of heirloom tomatoes and grilled peaches and herbs from the local farmers’ market, topped with a scoop of burrata cheese. Hummingbird cake for dessert, because who didn't like a hummingbird cake?

Day 8 after coming home from the hospital The classic recipes are goat, lamb, vegetable, and/or chicken biriyani. But when I was in New Orleans, at this restaurant, they served Louisiana barbecue shrimp, which was simply delicious. When I asked the waiter what was in the shrimp sauce, he rattled off a number of spices (rosemary, thyme, basil, oregano, et cetera) and so, I went with memory.  I marinated the raw prawns in mashed garlic, rosemary, basil, oregano, thyme, sage, paprika, black pepper, white pepper, cayenne, and onion powder, along with a dash of Worcestershire sauce. I decided to cook the rice in the pressure cooker, always quick and easy. I heated some ghee in the pressure cooker, added crushed cloves, cardamom, and cinnamon, and a bay leaf for a minute or so. Then I added some onions and fried until the onions became golden brown. Then went in the rice, and enough water, and I closed the pressure cooker. The rice was ready in ten minutes. In a separate pan, I sautéed the marinated prawns in butter, along with extra chopped garlic and the marinade, and added them to the cooked rice. I garnished it with chopped fresh coriander and voila, Cajun prawn biriyani. I served it with some regular cucumber raita. Mama had been so sure that Daddy would hate prawns but I saw him clean out each one on his plate and even get a second helping. Sometimes we forget why we don’t like some things and then when we try them again, we realize that we had been wrong. Giving Serious Though to Adultery Girish was a classical music buff and in the beginning of their marriage, Shobha joined him for a few musical events and lectures.

Orange juice and barbecue sauce. Then slow cook them at two fifty for four hours.

She starts out with pork-n-beans right out of the can, adds some kidney beans, a pound of bacon, and a pint of chopped-up ham, peppers, onions, and spicy barbecue sauce, but that's not her secret. It's a double shot of Jack Daniels and a tablespoon of red pepper flakes. That's her secret-and it makes the beans

Check out that curly hair.” Jayne sat and stared through the glass window of my corner office, drool dripping from her chin like barbecue sauce at an all-you-can-eat wings night. “It reminds me

I was struggling happily with my ribs. Normally I ended up with barbecue sauce in my socks when I ate ribs, but I always figured they were worth it.

WILD GAME MARINADE WITH JUNIPER AND GIN The year was 1976; the place, the La Varenne cooking school in Paris. A nice Jewish guy from Baltimore (yours truly) was about to have his first taste of wild game. Our instructor, Chef Fernand Chambrette, had secured a haunch of wild boar, and he prepared a traditional marinade of red wine and juniper berries to heighten its gamy flavor. A shot of gin reinforced the woodsy flavor of the juniper. If I’d known game could be this good, I would have tried it a lot sooner. You’ll be amazed by the power of this simple marinade to turn tame supermarket pork, beef, and even lamb into “wild” game. 3 cups dry red wine ½ cup balsamic vinegar ½ cup extra virgin olive oil 2 tablespoons gin 1 medium onion, thinly sliced 1 carrot, thinly sliced 1 rib celery, thinly sliced 2 cloves garlic, flattened with the side of a cleaver

Uncle Jeff insisted that I also take a tray of unseasoned barbecue, so I could see for myself that what's going on here at the Skylight Inn does not in any way, shape, or form depend for it's flavor or quality on "sauce." That is a word he pronounces with an upturned lip and a slight sneer, suggesting that the use of barbecue sauce was at best a culinary crutch deserving of pity and at worst a moral failing.

Barbecued Chicken Hands-on Time: 25 min. Total Time: 1 hr. 2 (4 1/2-lb.) whole chickens, quartered 1 tsp. salt, divided 1 tsp. pepper, divided 1 small onion, diced 3/4 cup ketchup 6 Tbsp. butter 3 Tbsp. light brown sugar 1 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce 1 1/2 tsp. hot sauce 1 1/2 tsp. dry mustard continued

In the world of premium, flame broils there are basically two roads that the makers appear to seek after. We have the do everything models and the particular objective models. Do everything flame broils concentrate on presenting to you a wide range of highlights for a better than average taste of close everything a barbecue can do while alternate concentrate on things like infrared barbecuing, warm maintenance or self-cleaning. This Weber Summit show is a do everything flame broil that matches premium stainless steel with different cooking alternatives, great power, and a cost around $1899 on the lower end for premium barbecues. Weber Summit 7170001 S-470 Stainless-Steel 580-Square-Inch 48,800-BTU Liquid-Propane Gas Grill With a ton of experience in grill design Weber brings to market this heavy duty premium grill. Here we have four main burners pumping 48,800 BTU’s of cooking power over propane gas. It doesn’t stop there though the highlight of this model is all of its grilling utility. Features 580-square-inch 48,800-BTU gas grill with stainless-steel cooking grates and Flavorizer bars Front-mounted controls; 4 stainless-steel burners; Snap-Jet individual burner ignition system Side burner, Sear Station burner, smoker burner, and rear-mounted infrared rotisserie burner Enclosed cart; built-in thermometer; requires a 20-pound LP tank (sold separately); LED fuel gauge - LP models only Measures 30 inches long by 66 inches wide by 57 inches high; 5-year limited warranty SABER SS 500 Premium Stainless Steel 3 Burner Gas Grill Silver is a valuable mineral and also an extravagant color as the natural color of stainless steel why would you not want to go all out. With that in mind, we have this Saber SS 500 premium gas grill. This grill features a completely stainless steel build housing three infrared burners for precise temperature contro Features Constructed with commercial grade 304 stainless steel for lasting durability Uses a patented infrared cooking system for even temperature, no flare-ups and 30% less propane consumption Dual tube side burner is ideal for greater versatility of using woks, skillets and pots, as well as boiling and frying side dishes and sauces 2 internal halogen lights so you can grill at any time of day Napoleon Grills PRO500RSIBPSS-2 Prestige Pro Series Gas Grills Propane The grilling extends beyond your basic setup with a heavy duty rear infrared rotisserie burner and a side infrared burner for searing purposes so whether you want a succulent roast of a hibachi style feast, burgers and hot dogs are just the beginning. Features 80, 000 BTU's Six burners 900 in total cooking area Premium stainless Steel construction

I can still see her so vividly from that weekend. The instant chemistry when we met, getting tipsy off beers, whiskey, and each other, licking sticky sweet barbecue sauce from the corner of her mouth, and then kissing her until we fell into bed. She danced for me—naked and carefree. I fell so fucking hard for her that night. Now, she doesn’t even know who I am.

I’d been a rock star ever since I could remember. I came out of my mother’s womb screaming for more than nipple and nurture. I was born to strut and fret my hour upon the stage, fill stadiums, do massive amounts of drugs, sleep with three nubile groupies at a time . . . AND endorse my own brand of barbecue sauce (oh no, that’s Joe).

We had driven miles to find the world's creamiest cheesecake and the world's largest pistachio nut and the world's sweetest corn on the cob. We had spent hours in blind taste testings of kosher hot dogs and double chocolate chip ice cream. When Julie went home to Fort Worth, she flew back with spareribs from Angelo's Beef Bar-B-Q, and when I went to New York, I flew back with smoked butterfish from Russ and Daughters. Once, in New Orleans, we all went to Mosca's for dinner, and we ate marinated crab, baked oysters, barbecued shrimp, spaghetti bordelaise, chicken with garlic, sausage with potatoes, and on the way back to town, a dozen oysters each at the Acme and beignets and coffee with chicory on the wharf. Then Arthur said, "Let's go to Chez Helene for the bread pudding," and we did, and we each had two. The owner of Chez Helene gave us the bread pudding recipe when we left, and I'm going to throw it in because it's the best bread pudding recipe I've ever eaten. It tastes like caramelized mush. Cream 2 cups sugar with 2 sticks butter. Then add 2 1/2 cups milk, one 13-ounce can evaporated milk, 2 tablespoons nutmeg, 2 tablespoons vanilla, a loaf of wet bread in chunks and pieces (any bread will do, the worse the better) and 1 cup raisins. Stir to mix. Pour into a deep greased casserole and bake at 350* for 2 hours, stirring after the first hour. Serve warm with hard sauce.

You said you’d welcome competition, yet you went and pulled some strings to drive away the first person to challenge you.” “I told you already. There must’ve been a clerical error.” She crossed her arms. “And scared? Please. My barbecue’s the best—I could beat anyone’s sauce, any day.” Her voice squeaked on the last word, and he let one corner of his mouth lift. “From what I heard around the market this morning, it’s your grandfather’s sauce, not yours.

She flicked a glance down his body with what might’ve been appreciation from someone else, but since it was Simone, he labeled the look as “disdain.” She picked up a bottle of barbecue sauce. “Naked Heat.” She blew a raspberry. Definitely disdain. “Hey, don’t shoot the messenger. Sex calls.” She arched a single brow, and something in him coiled tight. “Guess it depends on who’s selling it.

She dipped the spoon into a jar of sauce at random and shoved it in her mouth like cough syrup. Her treacherous taste buds lit up like firecrackers. Hoo boy, that did not taste anything like medicine. In fact, it tasted like failure. Not a single person in the audience would choose her sauce over that perfection. Tangy and sweet, with a hint of fire. Delicious. “Told you,” he said, and she realized she’d admitted it aloud.

My meal from Honey and Hickory came with a side of dysentery straight out of Oregon Trail.’” Finn now spat out the quote against the echo of Simone’s accusation, reciting from memory a review he’d found on a late-night, liquor-fueled deep dive into all things Honey and Hickory. “That’s a direct quote from a one-star review I found for Simone’s historic family restaurant online.” Simone strode forward and claimed center stage. “Written by a disgruntled cook who was fired for never showing up to work. It hardly classifies as empirical evidence.” “Look, Ms. Blake,” he said, leaning heavy on the honorific like she had, gratified when her eyes narrowed. “Beyond Honey and Hickory’s subpar reviews, your generic flavors can’t match the nuance of Finn’s Secret Sauce. You’re a mom-and-pop barbecue joint with no soul, stuck in the past.” Directing his next words to the investors, he said, “Whereas I’m all heart, focused on the future of barbecue. Sustainable, organic, outside-the-box flavor blends.” Simone clicked her tongue. “Organic? Wow, super cutting edge. If this was 1999.” Hands on her hips, she angled away from him, toward the crowd. “Honey and Hickory was farm to table long before it was fashionable, and we cook with locally sourced meat and home-grown produce.” “Like you had anything to do with that? Your grandfather probably set up those contacts while you were in diapers.” He turned his focus on the audience; two could play at that game. “Don’t let Ms. Blake fool you. She’s been at the helm of the restaurant for less than a year, yet she’s trying to convince you she played a role in Honey and Hickory’s decades of success.

Once, when I was a kid, I had impressed my mother, intuitively dipping a whole raw pepper into ssamjang paste at a barbecue restaurant in Seoul. The bitterness and spice of the vegetable perfectly married with the savory, salty taste of the sauce, itself made from fermented peppers and soybeans. It was a poetic combination, to reunite something in its raw form with its twice-dead cousin. "This is a very old taste," my mother had said.

I eyed the spread, wondering where I should start. Skewers of pork barbecue, the slightest hint of char releasing a delicious, smoky aroma, beckoned me, as did the platter of grilled adobo chicken wings next to it. As I loaded up my plate with meat, my aunt reached over to put a tofu-and-mushroom skewer on my mountain of rice. "Can you tell me what you think of this, anak? I'm testing the recipes for our Founder's Day booth and this will be our main vegetarian offering. I used a similar marinade as our barbecue, but it's not quite right." Looking at the array of food on the table, I noticed it was all pica-pica, or finger food. Things that could easily be prepared at the booth and eaten while wandering the festival. The barbecue skewers were obviously the mains, but she also had fish balls (so much better than it sounded) and my favorite, kwek-kwek. The hard-boiled quail eggs were skewered, dipped in a bright orange batter colored with annatto seeds, and deep-fried. So simple and delicious, especially if you dipped it in my aunt's sweet and spicy vinegar sauces.

I thought you said these were Chinese-style noodles... ...so I was expecting something with pork spareribs on top. The fish dumpling noodles in Hong Kong are good... but I've never seen anything like this in China. What's this on the top?" "Barbecued pork made from Berkshire boar, and jakoten." " 'Jakoten'? " "It's a specialty from the Shikoku prefecture. They're fish cakes made from ground sardines and deep-fried in oil. They're nutritious and taste good too." "Sardines, is it?" "Ah, this barbecued pork is completely different from Chinese-style barbecued pork!" "And this soup?" "I made the stock with pork bones and flying fish yakiboshi... ... and boosted the flavor with some miso and soy sauce. I don't use any MSG in it." "Hmm... the combination of pork bones and yakiboshi isn't something that a Chinese chef would have thought of." "I've never tasted a soup like this before!" "The noodles have no kansui in them. After kneading the dough with eggs... ... I let it rest for a whole week." "Mmm... they're firm and flavorful!" "I haven't seen noodles like this in China either!" "The aged noodles taste so good!

Even though hiyashi chūka is a dish that was developed in Japan, does it make a difference or not if one prepares it using Chinese ingredients? The most important things--- the noodles and the broth--- are both items borrowed from Chinese cuisine and are prepared using Chinese cooking methods. The barbecued pork on top is also Chinese-style. Which obviously means that Chinese condiments would be better suited to it. Chinese soy sauce and Japanese soy sauce taste different. The same goes for the sake and mirin. Shirō used the best ingredients he could get his hands on in Japan. That is perfectly fine as long as you're making Japanese food. But the Chinese condiments have a far better chemistry with the dish. Shirō paid great attention to each of the ingredients individually but neglected to consider the dish as a whole. Because the ingredients are Chinese, by using Chinese condiments... ... he was able to blend the flavors into one, which is impossible to do with Japanese condiments.

I could be making copies in the back room naked and covered in barbecue sauce, and none of them would comment.

I'll think about how I'll wear this week's favorite tee, even though it tugs across the love handles. I make peace with love handles, because they are American. Then I remember the tee has an undeniably hued barbecue sauce stain up near the neck, evidence of the cause of the love handles below. Maybe I could wear it anyway but crack a joke about it at the beginning of every conversation I have tonight.

Or the guy I went to homecoming with, who vanished halfway through the dance, and I found out later he’d been arrested for covering the principal’s car with chicken nuggets?” “How did he do that?” “Apparently barbecue sauce is fairly sticky.

Her accent [was] as tangy as barbecue sauce

The pandemic exposed key challenges in food delivery. Not all foods travel well even in short distances. Chefs toil to perfect recipes and customers expect the food as it appears on the restaurant website but time in transit distorts. A meatball sub barely survives a few feet let alone a car ride. Tomato sauce spills over the sandwich collecting at the bottom to soak the bread. Barbecue dishes suffer from congealing while nachos arrive both moist and brittle. Calamari grows chewy, mozzarella sticks turn into heavy weapons, and fries arrive limp. The enemy to food delivery, beyond stop lights, is moisture.

This brisket must have taken you hours," Hudson says, sitting next to me. "A brisket like this takes all night, son," Shawn says, not even looking at Hudson. All of the guards laugh. "Then you'd better walk me through how to serve this before I embarrass myself further," Hudson says. "Definitely," I say, passing the brisket to Shawn, at the head of the table. "You didn't have to agree so quickly," Hudson says. "You can do it a couple of ways. The white bread and the barbecue sauce plus the brisket make a nice sandwich, like Jace is doing," I say, pointing to the now silenced doubting Thomas. I continue, "Or you can just have the brisket with or without barbecue sauce and with or without the ranch beans and slaw, kind of blending in, like turkey, cranberries, and mashed potatoes at Thanksgiving," I say. "Isn't brisket supposed to be served with biscuits?" Hudson asks, serving himself some ranch beans. The conversation at the table screeches to a halt. The guards and Warden Dale just shake their heads and continue talking and eating. "I think from here on out, you just need to start actively censoring your thoughts and opinions. For your own safety," I say, laughing.

A good barbecue sauce should be as complex as the bouquet of a fine wine. It should have notes of sweetness, acidity, and a hint of pepperiness.

Then they get to Mississippi and Ella pauses because Mama sometimes talked about Mississippi and Ella imagines warmth and mosquitoes and tallgrass, haze more than smoke and lounging on cars with the smell of weed making a blanket and somebody’s blasting Motown music out the open doors of their beat-up four-door and everybody is everybody’s cousin and barbecue sauce is suddenly on people’s fingers and bellies bulge with plenty. Maybe Mama didn’t say all those things when she said the word “Mississippi.” Maybe she didn’t mention the mosquitoes or the music. But it was the only time Ella ever saw her not look like she was made of iron.

On the other side of the room, Molly saw an old man with sagging cheeks seated beside his frail wife, bony hand in bony hand. The sight of these people, who must have trudged together across the years, who’d aged to the point where they couldn’t age much more, awakened within Molly an alarming truth that somehow had never before hit her with such inevitability: one day she was going to come to a hospital like this one and her life would end. There would be something wrong with her heart or she’d have cancer of something important, and in one unceremonious moment, in a room so antiseptically bright and sterile that there’d be nowhere for her fear to burrow, she’d be carried out of this world for all of time. A stranger would then draw a sheet over her face and shuffle off to the break room for a snack, leaving the freshly dead Molly Erin Winger, born in Columbus, Ohio, unto Norman and Katherine Winger, alone among machines and boxes of rubber gloves that were no more alive or less dead than she. Then, a day or two later, some of the people with whom she’d shared the earth would put her in the ground. They’d watch her casket being lowered into the open soil and leave her there, all by herself, on a quiet hill among gravestones. Then those people would drive to someone’s house to nibble at turkey wraps and Caesar salad, lament the loss of a life, and ask if there was any barbecue sauce.

Meat loaf with mashed potatoes and green beans." I leave it at that, neglecting the mention that his meat loaf features ground veal and pork and is wrapped in caul fat and basted with a homemade fig barbecue sauce, that the potatoes are more of a classic Joel Robuchon pommes puree of such buttery silkiness that you want to bathe in them, and that the green beans are blistered and charred in caramelized fish sauce with lime.

I had my feast out on the kitchen table. Draped over beds of jasmine rice, thin pork chops seasoned with lemongrass showcased charred stripes from the grill. Cold summer rolls with translucent rice paper glimmered with riotous colors from the mint leaves, vermicelli, and shrimp filling. Emerald coriander leaves peeked out amid slices of barbecued pork, in golden, crusty baguette sandwiches called banh mi. I placed a few pieces of the pork onto a plate for the cat. I bit into the cold rolls first. The thin wrapper yielded to my teeth, giving way to the crunchy pickled vegetables and plump shrimp underneath. The mint leaf inside complemented the sweet sauce with crushed peanuts. The two small rolls vanished into my belly. I attacked the banh mi next. The crisp crust highlighted the varying textures of its filling: crisp from the pickled radish and carrots, textures sang on my tongue.

Baby Harper and I were having dinner together, as we had done every Saturday night for close to a year by then. We went into Shelby and sat in our usual booth at Bridges Barbecue Lodge. We each ordered a pulled pork sandwich, a side of coleslaw, fries with an extra order of barbecue sauce for dipping, peach cobbler (only available on Saturdays), and a bottle of Cheerwine, a cherry-flavored cola, bottled in nearby Salisbury, which my great-uncle said brought out the "fruit" in Bridges's sauce. Bridges Barbecue Lodge had two things going for it, which was more than I could say for the other dining options in town, Pizza Inn, Waffle House, Arby's, Roy Rogers, and Hardee's. In the mid-eighties the greater Boiling Springs-Shelby area attracted only the B-list fast-food chains. Bridges was in a league of its own. The first thing that made Bridges special was that, even by the standards of North Carolina barbecue, Bridges's sauce was extraordinarily vinegary, which meant it was extraordinarily good.

So this is sweet. Some sort of fruit, right? Not just sugar." She nodded. "Mango and peach." He looked surprised. "No kidding." He tasted it again. "Got it. Now that you tell me, I can taste them. What kind of chilies?" "Mostly fresno. A cherry pepper here, a poblano there. A little habanero." She hadn't gotten enough fresnos, so the truth was she just used everything she had. Fortunately she'd written it down. "Some honey too. Seasonings." "But there's something I can't quite put my finger on." He tasted more than looked at his finger and said, "No pun intended." She smiled. "Curry." "Curry." "Yup." She nodded. "I needed something to segue between the sweet and the savory and I thought of curry." "It's incredible." "Wow, you're actually selling me on my own sauce." She upended the bottle and put a few drops on her own finger. It was just as good as she'd remembered, exactly as he'd said, with the heat that snuck up and away. Suddenly her mind reeled with the possibilities. She could use it as the base for a barbecue sauce and start serving pulled pork on the menu. That, with the beer cheese, Aja's cheese soup, and the biscuits Margo had made, she had a theme developing suddenly.

At seven, Liam runs out to pick up some food for us. Her returns forty minutes later with seventy pounds of Chinese food from Orange Garden. "I didn't know what everyone liked. Plus none of us had lunch." He shrugs, unpacking egg rolls, pot stickers, barbecue ribs, pork lo mein, vegetable fried rice, sesame chicken, beef and broccoli, ma po tofu, cashew chicken, shrimp with peapods and water chestnuts, combination chow fun, and mushroom egg foo young. White rice, plenty of sauces, and about forty-two fortune cookies. A six-pack of Tsingtao beer.

it's often said that knowing who you are, or at the very least possessing a sneaking suspicion of such early in life, is a blessing. The people who share this sentiment need to write it on a piece of paper, ball it up, and then proceed to pour barbecue sauce all over it as they eat it. Early self awareness is a blessing only if you are comes with a support system and an education. If you don't have those, it's easy to find yourself feeling stuck and sullen. I learned a certain part of my identity very early, but it was met with near-instant confirmation of how unwelcome that part of my identity was to those surrounding me.

5. Remove the pan from the oven, and use two forks to pull the meat apart in the pan juices, shred-ding it coarsely. 6. For each sandwich, halve a poppy seed roll. Spoon about 2 tablespoons heated barbecue sauce over the bottom. Using a slotted spoon, pile about 1 cup of the shredded meat on the roll. Then pour 2 or 3 tablespoons sauce over the meat, and cover with the top half of the roll. 7. Serve with additional barbecue sauce on the side.

Common foods that are high in sodium: Bacon Bagels Baked goods Barbecue sauce Blended coffee drinks

WHOA! Now that's some thick-cut bacon!" "Oh my gosh! Look! The top of it is gleaming! Just looking at it is making me hungry..." "Wait a minute. If he's copying the transfer student, then the meat he's using should be oxtail, right? So why is he bringing out bacon?" If he's adding bacon to beef stew, there's only one thing it could be. A GARNISH! THE BACON IS MEANT TO BE A SIDE DISH TO THE STEW. Yukihira's recipe is the type that calls for straining the demi-glace sauce at the end to give it a smooth texture. That means its only official ingredients are the meat and the sauce, making for a very plain dish. Garnishes of some sort are a necessity! Beef simmered in red wine- the French dish thought to be the predecessor to beef stew- always comes with at least a handful of garnishes. The traditional garnishes are croutons, glazed pearl onions, sautéed mushrooms... ... and bacon! Then that means... he's going to take that thick, juicy bacon and add it to the stew?!" "Now he's sautéing those extra-thick slices of bacon in butter! He's being just as efficient and delicate as always." "Man, the smell of that bacon is so good! It's smoky, yet still somehow mellow..." "What kind of wood chips did he use to give it that kind of scent?" "You wanna know what I used? Easy. It's mesquite." "Mess-keet?" "Have you heard of it?" "It's a small tree used for smoking that's native to Mexico and the Southern U.S. You'll hardly find it used anywhere in Japan though." "Ibusaki!" Mesquite is one of the most popular kinds of wood chips in Texas, the heartland of barbecues and grilling. Because of its sharp scent, it's mostly used in small quantities for smoking particularly rough cuts of meat, giving them a golden sheen. "But I didn't stop there! I added a secret weapon to my curing compound- Muscovado sugar! I sweetened my curing compound with Muscovado, sage, nutmeg, basil and other spices, letting the bacon marinate for a week! It will have boosted the umami of the bacon ten times over!

2 teaspoons dried rosemary 1 teaspoon celery seeds 2 teaspoons chicken bouillon granules or 1 chicken bouillon cube, crushed ¾ cup sugar 1 tablespoon dry mustard 2 teaspoons onion powder 2 teaspoons garlic powder 1½ teaspoons kosher salt 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 2 cups yellow ballpark-style mustard ⅔ cup apple cider vinegar 3 tablespoons tomato paste or ketchup ½ teaspoon Tabasco Chipotle Sauce or your favorite hot sauce 1. Prep. Crush the rosemary and celery seeds in a mortar and pestle or in a blender or coffee grinder. Transfer to a bowl, add the remaining ingredients, and mix thoroughly. 2. Cook. Pour the mixture into a saucepan and bring to a simmer. Cook for 5 minutes. Taste and adjust the seasoning as you wish. Storing it overnight in the fridge helps meld the flavors.

Okay, first there are the angels on horseback and devils on horseback." Blake shakes his head. "Remind me what those are?" "An English thing. Angels on horseback are baked oysters wrapped in bacon. Devils are the same thing with dates instead of oysters." Blake nods. "Got it. What else?" "I'm going to slow-cook the barbecued ribs and serve them as 'skeleton ribs,' and I'll serve up the calamari tentacles as 'deep-fried spiders.' Then I'll roast the shrimp and arrange them in glasses of ice to look like claws or fingers, which people can dip into a 'Bloody Mary' cocktail sauce. And I'll scatter platters of deviled eggs around the living and dining rooms." "Think that'll be enough food?" "Definitely, I'll throw some cheese and crudités into the mix, too. Oh, and dessert- spiced devil's food cupcakes and blood orange sorbet.

She'd gotten the butcher to grind a mixture of filet mignon and chuck steak for the burgers, and had blended in mushrooms and blue cheese; she'd ordered hot dogs from Chicago, which came delivered in a cooler of dry ice. She'd made her own barbecue sauce, plus dozens of elaborate canapés, slivers of smoked salmon on cucumbers and a refined version of onion dip, where she spent an hour caramelizing onions.

Yin-yang fried rice was a feast for the eyes and the senses. Swirls of cream contrasted with an orange tomato sauce to form the iconic pattern. Underneath the sauces lay a bed of yang chow fried rice containing a bounty of minced jewels: barbecued pork, Chinese sausage, peas, carrots, spring onions, and wisps of egg. Slices of white onions and pork emerged from the tomato sauce while shrimp and sweet green peas decorated the cream.

Mae drew closer, bending down to peer at the tiny words written on the ripped scraps of paper. Most of the pieces were no bigger than a Post-it. Smothered chicken. Shrimp and grits. Lamb chops. Fried chicken. Black-eyed peas. Chicken pot pie. Oyster dressing. Corn casserole. Barbecue sauce. Seeing these felt like being reunited with an old friend. The tiny handwriting was unfamiliar, but the dishes jumped out at her like memories. Her dad had talked about some of these. He'd told her about shrimp and grits on those mornings at Skyline Diner. And he'd mentioned oyster dressing and corn casserole once when Mae had asked him what his family ate at Thanksgiving. The barbecue sauce might have been something Althea made a big vat of for their annual Fourth of July event.

It was sheer debauchery, featuring barbecue ribs. Next to it she added a fried onion blossom with bacon-chipotle, sweet 'n spicy mustard, and creamy chili dipping sauces.