Sticky Fingers Carolina Classic Barbecue Sauce (3/5)
The BBQ sauce world does not revolve around tomatoes, so I had to review a mustard-based sauce for my fellow sauce lovers. This well-known Southern Carolina style, Sticky Fingers Carolina Classic Barbecue Sauce fit the bill. There’s some positives and negatives here, so this will be my first middle-of-the-road rating (3/5). My wife has a serious mustard problem habit and I’ve tried some great mustards and used them as chicken/rib/fish sauces and they came out quite a bit better than this… hence the rating of a 3. I will keep exploring this mustard BBQ sauce style, as I think there’s a lot of potential for a disruptive brand to really make their mark in this category.
When preparing, keep in mind that because you are using a mustard sauce and not a tomato-based sauce (which tend to have a lot more sugar) so you can truly apply as much as you want, whenever you want. The sugar in this stuff will not burn off on the grill. It will lose some of its oomph, but there’s really no trick to just keep adding more sauce… Put some chicken breasts in a bucket with this stuff. Let a rack of ribs bond with it. Let them sit overnight. Let them mate. Then throw them on the grill the next day. While cooking, keep adding more. You’ll experience a unique and rich mustard meat flavor.
Then tell me how you like this flavor compared to more traditional sauces you’ve had.
Smell: OK. Like sniffing a slightly subdued dijon mustard.
Taste: Nice mustard flavor, but no kick or zip or heat.As my wife put it succintly - it tastes like ketchup and mustard mixed together. For a Carolina Class, it’s kinda boring.
Consistency: Very good, smooth, and “clingy”.
Packaging/Branding: Good bottle shape and font and simple, uncluttered appearance. Stands out, but a little dull. Sticky Fingers? Great name. A decent Rolling Stones album too.
Ingredients: Mustard, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Water, Cider Vinegar, Tomato Paste, Spices, Sodium Benzoate for shelf life. (Good = limited ingredients, Bad = High Fructose Corn Syrup , aka HFCS - the killer sweetener… more here).
Nutrition Info: 8G carbs, 0g Fat, 200mg Sodium, 35 Calories per serving (30g)
Ordering Information
Comment by Matt Larson | February 28th, 2008
Brian, my man, you need to try Melvin’s BBQ “golden secret” mustard sauce (available online).
Sticky fingers is the “boxed wine” of Carolina BBQ. If you’re reallllly in need of a cheap fix then have it, but you’re probably not going to bring it to a dinner party