Tangy, sweet, and savory, a good barbecue sauce can upgrade a bowl of crispy chicken wings or elevate a simple steak dinner in seconds. Along with ketchup and mustard, this characterful condiment is a common sight in kitchens, diners, and steakhouses due to its rich texture and smoky quality. But not every barbecue sauce at the grocery store has that perfect, complex balance of flavors. After performing an extensive taste test on several varieties of this ubiquitous sauce, we found that some are packed with additives and sodium whereas others are too sweet, or mouth-puckeringly tangy. The barbecue sauce brand you should never buy on your next trip to the supermarket? Happy Belly original barbecue sauce.
The loser in our list of 15 popular barbecue sauce brands, ranked worst to best, this condiment had an unpleasant texture that was almost mucous-like. This gelatinous consistency immediately put us off even though the flavor wasn’t bad. Having said that, Happy Belly’s offering didn’t have the hallmark taste of a true blue barbecue sauce either. We wanted it to be rich and thick with a little texture but it was gooey and strangely smooth. The list of ingredients also includes several additives like guanylic acid and sodium enzoate, in contrast to the other sauces we tried, such as Bone Suckin’ Sweet Southern sauce (third place in our taste test), which combines the acidity of tomatoes with the caramel flavor of molasses.
Happy Belly original barbecue sauce has a gelatinous texture
Happy Belly original barbecue sauce contains an additive called xanthan gum, which helps to stabilize emulsions. This common ingredient is also supposed to enhance the viscosity of sauces and improve their fluidity but add too much and it can turn liquids into a gel. We’re guessing that this additive could be the cause of the sauce’s unappetizing gelatinous texture.
We reckon you’d be better off making your own sweet and tangy BBQ sauce with a combination of pantry staples, such as ketchup, vinegar, and spices to create a customized condiment that’s free from preservatives and additives. In fact, you can make an even easier, tangy BBQ sauce with three ingredients you already have: ketchup, brown sugar, and mustard.
The winner in our taste test was Bachan’s Japanese barbecue sauce, which is free from additives, flavorings, and preservatives too. Unlike a classic barbecue sauce, this deeply savory and salty condiment features fermented soy sauce and mirin. However, the dash of cane sugar added to the recipe, lifted its umami quality and created the perfect balance. This winning product also has a runnier consistency than the other condiments we tried, which means it can moonlight as a marinade, basting liquid, or dressing. You could even drizzle this truly all-purpose sauce over a serving of fried rice or use it as a sweet and sticky coating for ribs.
