Beer BBQ Sauce

Beer BBQ Sauce Ingredients

• Onion. Brings savory flavor and contributes to the texture and body of the sauce. 
• Cooking oil. To saute the diced onion. 
• Beer. Refer to the details in the next section for suitable styles. 
• Brown sugar. Adds more depth of flavor than refined sugar can. Also consider Muscovado.
• Organic ketchup. Adds acidity, sweetness and umami and contributes to the overall mouthfeel of the sauce by giving it body. Use an organic tomato sauce if you’d rather not go with ketchup.
• Apple cider vinegar. Our preferred type of vinegar to cook with as it is not harshly acidic. 
• Honey. Adds its unique type of sweetness and contributes to the consistency of the sauce. 
• Cumin. A bit goes a long way and accentuates the overall umami in the sauce. You can use spices like smoked paprika or caraway instead. 
• Garlic. We typically go with garlic powder, but you can also sauté minced garlic for about a minute, just before you add the beer (see workflow below).
• Black pepper. Our preferred source of heat when we make a not particularly spicy barbecue sauce. 
• Salt. Season with coarse salt and add it as needed after you’ve already made the sauce.

Beer Style Recommendations

In our humble opinion (which is however based on many, many batches of beer BBQ sauce made over the years), the best beer styles to use in homemade barbecue sauce are ones that will contribute malty, roasty notes, dark fruit and chocolate flavors and are not aggressively hoped or bittered by way of liberal use of roasted barley. 

Do not be afraid of a hoppier brew though, a moderate bitterness does act as a balancing act to sweeteners such as sugar and honey. 

We most often reach for:

• amber ales or lagers
• red ales (including red IPAs, mmm), brown ales, porters and stouts
• dark German beers such as doppelbock lagers or Altbier
• Rauchbier (German smoked lager) when we wish the beer to impart smokiness
• winter warmers with complex spice notes

Which is not to say that imperial or bourbon aged ales, citrusy ales or lambics such as kriek are not great contenders.

How to Make Beer BBQ Sauce – Workflow

A note on equipment first. Ideally use a wide and deep sauce pan because a wider bottom surface means faster reduction time.

A handheld immersion blender is perfect, especially in combination with a deeper saucepan (less splattering). If you do not have an immersion blender you can always blend the sauce in a food processor or blender, just be sure to allow it to cool down some. 

Step 1. Sauté onions in oil until softened.

Step 2. Add the beer (only a bit at first, to deglaze, it will foam once it makes contact with the hot saucepan), then add the rest and let the mixture simmer until reduced by about half. 

TIP: If you want the beer flavors to play a more prominent role, do not fear to increase the quantity of beer. You will simply need to wait longer until it reduces by half.

Step 3. Add the rest of the ingredients (except salt), stir and let the mixture simmer until it thickens. 

Step 4. Remove from heat and blend. Taste and season with salt as needed. Transfer to a container and let cool down before use. 

Making Beer Barbecue Sauce is About Creating Flavors

We are sharing our basic recipe with a great deal of hope that as fellow cooking with beer aficionados you will tweak it and play with it to create something special for you and your loved ones.

While you can absolutely adhere to it the first time you make a beer BBQ sauce and use the exact ingredients and quantities as listed in the recipe card, we encourage you to make it your own.

Do not be afraid to experiment, in fact, let your imagination run loose. There are so many directions you can go with a homemade barbecue sauce that features a tasty beer. 

In the past we have made the following two variations of the subject principal beer barbecue sauce recipe. We look forward to sharing them here on Craft Beering in the very near future. 

Bright & Citrus Infused Beer BBQ Sauce 

We use orange juice and either an American wheat ale or a citrusy, low bitterness IPA in this version. 

Dark & Luscious Beer BBQ Sauce

We use balsamic vinegar and either a porter or a chocolate stout in this version.