Best Store Bought BBQ Sauce
What is the Best Store Bought BBQ Sauce?
I’ve tried a reasonable number of store-bought BBQ sauces and I’ve found a few brands to be extremely popular in a variety of online surveys and forums across the web. I’ve lumped them into 5 main categories:
- Super Sweet and Thick (often called “KC Style” which is by far the most popular category in BBQ Sauce-ville)
- Sweet and Smoky (usually a sauce with some sweet and liquid smoke).
- Tangy Sauces (usually comes from use of more vinegar and gives a slightly sour flavor which many folks love on pork)
- Mustard-based (this is not 100% mustard, it’s usually a BBQ sauce with a little or a lot of mustard added).
- Sauces with Heat (each of the above categories can be amended to include heat, but some people like it and some don’t)
- Other (this isn’t really a category, it’s for sauces that don’t fit other places like mashes, relishes, marinades, fruit-based stuff, etc)
1. The Best Store Bought Super Sweet & Thick BBQ Sauces
- Sweet Baby Rays (SBR) Original
- Bullseye KC Style or Original
2. The Best Store Bought Sweet and Smoky BBQ Sauces
- Bullseye Hickory Smoke
- Some variants of SBR also deliver on the liquid smokiness if you like that.
3. The Best Store Bought Tangy BBQ Sauces
- Open Pit is super tangy – many people mix this with a sweet sauce like SBR
- Stubbs is also a vinegar based choice which many folks love
4. The Best Store Bought Mustard-Based Sauces
- Hmm. I’m hard pressed to think of a good mustard-based BBQ Sauce brand that is available on a national level. Perhaps Salt Lick. Or Carolina Treet. But I think these are still rather regional. Any ideas?? Maybe Bullseye Carolina style? My suggestion – get your favorite BBQ sauce and some dijon mustard and add them together until you are satisifed. Put the resulting combination on a pork based dish.
5. The Best Store Bought BBQ Sauces with Heat
- Sweet Baby Ray’s Honey Chipotle
- Bullseye Memphis has a little kick
- KC Masterpiece Hot & Spicy is also decent
- Another idea here to take your favorite BBQ sauce and mix it Frank’s Red Hot, Tabasco, or your favorite hot sauce. Like BBQ Sauces, there’s a whole world to explore out there.
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Great list Brian! I would have to say my favorite store bought sauces would have to be Sweet Baby Ray’s Original and also Sweet Baby Ray’s Honey. The homemade sauce I make kind of reminds me of Sweet Baby Ray’s Original. I love the sweet ones!
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SBR is, IHMO, the best mass-market, store-bought sauce available. I like to support the local guys and buy locally made sauces but SBR is a generic favorite. I’m pretty lucky though…my local grocer sells Blues Hog
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I concur, although I do have a soft spot personally for Bullseye Original but I also love Sweet Baby Ray’s. Mmmmmm.
@Brian: same here, I love Bull’s Eye Original and SBR Honey ! Yum yum yum
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Im an open pit fan for store bought brands. Its good to see it on your top five!
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I think Sweet Baby Ray’s is ok, but there are much better sauces out there. I prefer barbecue sauces that aren’t super sweet. A little sweetness is fine, but it’s more important for the sauce to have at least a little bit of a kick and some boldness to it. I don’t think Sweet Baby Ray’s has enough of that sweet/bold balance. My favorite store bought sauce is Stubbs, no contest.
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