I love trying out new BBQ sauces. Every time I'm at a grocery store, I always have to check out the aisle with all of the spices, herbs, and sauces. You can really tell what store and region you're at just by looking at the selection. In California, you'll find all of the usual commercial brands like Kraft, KC Masterpiece, and Sweet Baby Ray's. In some of the higher end stores like Whole Foods, you'll see Bone Suckin' Sauce (highly rated by many) and even sauce from the Salt Lick in Texas.
BBQ sauce sales an insane multi-billion dollar business, with celebrities and chefs fighting for shelf space in stores. Even the stars from the show Lizard Lick Towing has their own line of BBQ sauces. An astute reader of the blog pointed out that it had been well over 7 months since my post on Lizard Lick Towing. I mentioned that I had a bottle of their branded BBQ sauce and that I would review it. Well, better late than never.
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| Nothing like having your face on a bottle of BBQ sauce! |
"Sauce so good... it'll run a bulldog off a meat wagon at lunch time!"
With a catchy slogan like that, you can't help but want to try this sauce, right? As you can see by the picture, this is Eastern Carolina Barbecue Sauce, with the words peppery vinegar right above. There's no doubt that "peppery vinegar" perfectly sums up the flavor profile for this sauce. Now I've never been to North or South Carolina, but I do know that Carolina-style BBQ is all about the thin and vinegar-based sauce to go along with whole hog.
Looking at the listed ingredients, number one is apple cider vinegar, which is no surprise. That is the most prominent flavor, followed by... what else? Pepper. Also included are regular vinegar, ketchup, onion powder, and a little bit of crushed red pepper and cayenne to give the sauce a slight kick in the end. I actually love a good, spicy kick on my BBQ sauce and I wished it was even more spicy.
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| You can see plenty of black and red pepper flakes in this thin sauce |
The consistency is classic Carolina style -- it's thin, but not watery, with bold and pronounced vinegar and peppery flavors. This sauce is perfect for both basting and marinating on one thing only -- PIG. If you're smoking some pork shoulder or whole hog and you're looking for that vinegar-based flavor profile, this sauce would be a nice compliment. You can also use this sauce as a marinade for chicken. It should give the chicken a subtle tart and tangy finish throughout the meat. I wouldn't use this sauce on beef or seafood.
If you're a fan of the show and you like vinegar based BBQ sauce, sure why not give it a try. The bottle says to visit www.lizardlick.co for recipes and cooking ideas, but if you visit the site it's a suspended domain written in Spanish! After a web search, it looks like this is the real site.
Dirty Smoke rating (out of 5 stars)
Lizard Lick Towing, Peppery vinegar Eastern Carolina - 3 stars
