I like to eat with the seasons. Fall welcomes apple crisps and pumpkin pies; winter is a time for hearty stews and lots of potatoes; spring brings fresh, colorful greens; and summer is hallmarked by barbecue-everything.
Barbecued hamburgers. Barbecued chicken. Barbecued ribs. These are a few of my favorite things. Deciding what to grill is always easy. It’s deciding what to slather my favorite meats in that is the hard part.
This barbecue sauce, made with Shrub Stepp Smokehouse Brewery’s Wildfyre is a trifecta of spicy, smoky and sweet. Sometimes conjuring up smoky flavors without a bottle of liquid smoke is hard. Shrub Stepp’s Wildfyre makes it easy. After all, the brewery is all about infusing barbecue with beer, which it does on site at its location in Richland, Washington.
Whether you use it as the marinade for chicken legs or as a generous condiment for burgers, this versatile barbecue sauce always hits the spot.
Prep time: 10 minutes
Cook time: 20 minutes
Rest time: 1 hour
Makes: About 4 cups
Ingredients:
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 yellow onion, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 jalapeno, diced
1 teaspoon kosher salt
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
3 tablespoons chili powder
½ cup brown sugar
½ cup molasses
1 cup crushed canned pineapple (reserve juice, optional)
2 cups ketchup
½ cup yellow mustard
½ cup apple cider vinegar
½ cup Shrub Steppe Smokehouse Brewery’s Wildfyre
Directions:
In a large skillet over medium-high heat, sauté onion, red bell pepper, garlic and jalapeno until golden brown, about 10 minutes.
Reduce heat to medium and add salt, pepper, chili powder and brown sugar until combined. Add molasses, pineapple, ketchup, mustard, apple cider vinegar and beer, and stir well.
Continue cooking, covered, at a simmer for one hour. After the barbecue sauce has cooked at a simmer for one hour, remove from heat and cool slightly.
Next, using an immersion blender, blend sauce until it is smooth and free of lumps. Use sauce immediately, or store in refrigerator for a few days.
Note: If the sauce is too thick for your liking, you can make it thinner using the reserved pineapple juice.
