The world needs more *natural* BBQ sauce

Dragon Mood? -- hungry and salivating

My honey, S, likes to grill. She likes to grill meat. She is the grill-mistress in our family.

And, by the natural order of things, I am the shopping-mistress in the family. And, I've been looking at more marinades and BBQ sauces on the grocery store shelves in the past couple of years than I have in the previous forty-something years of my life!

And do you know what virtually all of these ready-made sauces and marinades have in them? -- many of them, the first ingredient (meaning it is the most plentiful ingredient)?: high fructose corn syrup. Yup, sweet corn syrup. Which, when you think about it, makes sense, because BBQ sauce does give meat a sweet taste.

Having said that, I happened upon the following recipe for BBQ sauce and (surprise, surprise!) its first ingredient is a cup of sugar. But I'm gonna publish it anyway, and then I'm gonna fix it and S can give it a try on the ol' grill this weekend:

Barbecue Sauce
Makes about 3 quarts

Ingredients:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup salt
2 tablespoons celery seed
2 tablespoons ground cumin
2 tablespoons ground red pepper
2 tablespoons garlic powder
2 tablespoon chili powder
2 quarts catsup
2 cups apple vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons liquid smoke
1 teaspoon lemon juice

Directions:
In a small bowl, six together sugar, salt, celery seed, cumin, red pepper, garlic powder and chili powder. Set aside.

In a large bowl, combine catsup, vinegar, liquid smoke, and lemon juice. Add dry ingredients and mix until very well blended. Serve warm of at room temperature.

Sauce may be stored in an airtight container in refrigerator for 2-3 weeks or in freezer up to 6 months.

Recipe courtesy of Gates BBQ. You can find more recipes at their Web site: www.gatesbbq.com.

And I found this recipe here.