Recipe Friday: 6/29 Grilled BBQ Chicken

Happy Friday before the 4th of July!! So hopefully you all have something fun planned for America's birthday. BBQs will be on fire this weekend, and on the 4th too, so I thought it best to give you a recipe for homemade BBQ sauce, and then how to use it for some delicious BBQing.

The base for this sauce is actually ketchup... it has a good amount of sugar and vinegar, but also good tomato flavor. Now you can make it from scratch scratch if you'd like using tomato paste, vinegar, water etc, but it will take a long time to achieve the taste that ketchup has, so buy a good organic ketchup minus all the corn syrup and additives etc., and it will taste delicious. I added some of my own things to this recipe to make it taste the way I wanted it to, so of course you can add or eliminate items you don't like. Once this sauce is cooked down and cooled a bit, it can be used on many different proteins, I am choosing to use it on chicken thighs. I love BBQ chicken thighs! They are of course dark meat and have a little more fat, so the flavor is better than the breast, and the fat renders on the BBQ nicely. Again though, you can use this on pulled pork, ribs, tri-tip, or hey even salmon. Whatever you are grilling this next week, this sauce will taste finger licking good. So get outside and grill up some yummy food, and enjoy the 4th with your friends, family, and of course great food. And as always, Happy Cooking.

Homemade BBQ Sauce
2 cups ketchup
1/4 onion
1 clove garlic
4 tblspn worchestershire sauce
1 tspn liquid smoke
4 tblspn brown sugar
3 tblspn apple cider vinegar
1 tblspn crushed red pepper flakes
1tblspn dijon mustard
2-3 cups water, depending on the texture you want
salt and pepper to taste

-In an immersion blender, or cuisinart mixer, pulse all ingredients until you have a puree. Put puree and 1 1/2 cups water. into a sauce pot, and heat to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and reduce for about an hour, add more water is needed and reduce until desired texture is reached. Allow to cool.

-Take fresh chicken thighs and toss with bbq sauce, save some of the sauce for post grilling coating. Zest lemon peel, 1/4 onion, and 1 clove garlic into the mixture. marinade for up to 2 hours. Throw on a hot grill, and cook until done. (depending on the size of the thighs and heat cooking time may vary)