Best Barbecue Sauce: Our Taste Test Results

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Americans love their barbecue, and so do we! Any good barbecue starts with a sauce, and most backyard grill masters use store-bought because it's quick and easy. But with all the countless barbecue sauces available in the market, it can be intimidating to find the best one. So we decided to put as many bottled sauces as we could find to a blind taste test--26 different kinds, 24 different brands. We tested popular All-American brands as well as regional barbecue sauces from the South. The winning sauce surprised us.

See our rankings below.

Barbecue Sauce Taste Test

Barbecue Sauces--Taste Test

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Jerry

If you have not tried Stubbs, you are missing out. It's the only one I use. Order it from Texas by the case. Stubbs was a friend of mine, and by far had the best BBQ. Cooked for 2 Presidents, great man!

September 02 2011 at 6:12 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

dascaul

your writers, editors and testers really need to sample Mrs. Griffin's Bar b que sauce like the label say Good on everything go to Mrs Griffins Barbeque.com and get yourself some and tell Roland hello

September 02 2011 at 10:28 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

calevitt

Are you sure this list isn't reversed? The top 5 are the worst 5 in my opinion. Who the hell did the tasting?

July 12 2011 at 3:21 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

sakebikaze

Ok so not one sauce that doesn't have bad comments. Horrible article.

July 06 2011 at 3:25 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

ADAM PAUL MANZO

My Tastebuds tell me Sweet Baby Rays which was as similar to my memory of the best tasting BBQ sauce ever from about 43 years ago from a street vendor in Indiana.

July 06 2011 at 2:24 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

1 reply to ADAM PAUL MANZO's comment

EISMAN2010

My Tasteduds say the same,Good Stuff, L.A. in Texas

September 02 2011 at 8:16 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

hjpieman

it was a shame to find that el paso sauce comes from texas? el paso, texas?

July 05 2011 at 9:32 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Walt Stephenson

We LOVE Sweet Baby Ray's! Whoever voted on this taste test, does not know BBQ! Most of the sauces that had good ratings are nasty! (I.E. Kraft - yuck!)

July 05 2011 at 5:36 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Richard Gjertsen

the sause is the boss ,the one the only , nothing compares to it SWEET BABYRAYS

July 04 2011 at 10:15 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Pit Master

Sweet baby rays is #24 with good comments such as "meaty" and no negatives yet many sauces ranked higher had "plastic" or "icky" in the description. Any list that has KC Masterpiece in the top 15 is bogus.

Try Pat's Ho-Made from FL or go with Sweet Baby Rays: two of the best. And these are comments from a Aoutherner

July 04 2011 at 3:40 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply