Honey BBQ Sauce
This honey BBQ Sauce is incredibly easy. You can either quick can it or water bath can it for longer storage.
It has a similar taste to Sweet Baby Ray’s Honey barbecue sauce. Sweet with just enough tang from the vinegar.
It’s a delicious condiment to add to all of your favorite grilled foods.
What you need
- large canned tomato sauce – about 28 oz. / 800 gr. use homemade tomato sauce or a good quality store bought brand.
- olive oil
- onion – dice very small
- garlic – mince fine – you could substitute garlic powder
- honey – use local honey if you can find it
- brown sugar – I like dark brown sugar to give the sauce a darker color but light brown sugar works too.
- molasses – dark black strap
- red wine vinegar – apple cider vinegar will work but the red wine has a better flavor.
- pineapple juice.
- Worcestershire sauce
How to make it
- Add oil to large pot. Using medium heat, sauté until soft.
- Add garlic and sauté until fragrant.
- Place the remaining ingredients in with the onion and garlic. Bring to simmer.
- Simmer for at least 2-3 hours, stirring occasionally until thick like the consistency of BBQ sauce.
You can place the BBQ sauce in sterile mason jars and refrigerate for a couple months. For longer storage, you can water bath can this sauce.
How to water bath can
- Wash jars and lids. Heat jars and lids. (you can heat them in the canning pot.)
- Using a canning funnel, fill hot jars with hot honey bbq sauce, leaving 1/2″ / 1.3 cm.
- Remove any air bubbles with plastic or wooden chop stick.
- Wipe rims with damp paper towel.
- Top jar with warm lid.
- Tighten band fingertip tight.
- Place jars in canning pot. Bring to low boil. Once boiling, process for 15 minutes. Remove pot from the heat. Remove lid. Allow jars to stay in hot water at least 5 minutes.
After 5 minutes, remove the jars from the water on to a kitchen towel on the counter. Allow to sit for 12-24 hours. Test lids for seal. (if lid flexes after cooling jar has not sealed. You can either reprocess that jar, with a new lid or store it in the refrigerator and use it first.
Pro tips to ensure your success
- Use a good quality canned tomato sauce that has a consistent texture.
- You can simmer this sauce for as long as you like to get the texture you want.
- If you can’t finish it in one day, refrigerate overnight and then reheat the next day with lid on, until it is simmers. Then remove lid and continue cooking it down.
- If you don’t want to process the sauce, do a small batch that you can use up in a few months.
- If you would like to process the sauce, you can double or even quadruple this recipe with no problem.
- Dice onions very fine. Mince the garlic fine too.
- You can use another vinegar but the red wine vinegar gives the BBQ sauce the best flavor, I have found.
What to use this honey BBQ sauce on
Use it on pork, chicken, beef, fish or anything else you enjoy BBQ sauce on. Amazing on ribs, brisket and chicken wings. Even burgers and fries are great with this sauce instead of plain old ketchup. BBQed meatballs are super tasty. Make a BBQed pizza. There are so many uses for this versatile condiment.
Other BBQ sauce recipes
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Enjoy. And have fun cooking!
Honey BBQ Sauce
This honey BBQ Sauce is incredibly easy. You can either quick can it or water bath can it for longer storage. Use it for pork, chicken, beef, even fish.
See Step by Step Photos Above!Most of our recipes have step by step photos and videos! Also helpful tips so that you can make it perfectly the first time and every time! Scroll up to see them!
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Servings: 2 pints
Calories: 649kcal
Cost: $3
Ingredients
- 28 ounce can tomato sauce
- ½ cup Onion
- ⅛ cup garlic, minced
- ½ cup honey
- ½ cup brown sugar
- ¼ cup molasses
- 7 tablespoon Red Wine Vinegar
- ⅛ cup pineapple juice
- ⅛ cup worchestershire sauce
Instructions
- Dice onion very fine. Mince garlic very fine.½ cup Onion, ⅛ cup garlic, minced
- Add a bit of olive oil to a large saucepan over medium heat.
- Sauté onion until translucent. Add garlic. Sauté until fragrant.
- Add remaining ingredients. Combine.28 ounce can tomato sauce, ½ cup honey, ½ cup brown sugar, ¼ cup molasses, 7 tablespoon Red Wine Vinegar, ⅛ cup pineapple juice, ⅛ cup worchestershire sauce
- Bring sauce to a fast simmer. Simmer for 2-3 hours, until desired thickness is reached, stirring occasionally.
Water bath canning instructions – optional
- To can this sauce, heat jars and lids in water bath canning pot.
- Remove one jar at a time and drain water. Fill jars, using a canning funnel and ladle, leaving ½" / 1.3cm headspace.
- Fill remaining jars.
- Remove air bubbles with a plastic or wooden chopstick. (or something similar)
- Wipe the rims of the jars with a damp paper towel.
- Center warmed lid on jar.
- Screw on bands fingertip tight.
- Carefully add jars to hot water in canning pot with a jar lifter.
- Bring water to a low boil. Process pint jars for 15 minutes. Remove from heat.
- Allow jars to sit in hot water for five minutes. Then remove jars from canning pot. Place on kitchen towel on the counter. Leave undisturbed for 12-24 hours.
- Test lids to make sure they have sealed. Press down in the center of the lid. If it flexes, the jar has not sealed properly and should be stored in the refrigerator.
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Notes
Calories given above are for one pint of sauce. There are 32 tablespoons per pint so the calories per pint is about 20 calories per tablespoon.
Pro tips
- Use a good quality canned tomato sauce that has a consistent texture.
- You can simmer this sauce for as long as you like to get the texture you want.
- If you can’t finish it in one day, refrigerate overnight and then reheat the next day with lid on, until it is simmers. Then remove lid and continue cooking it down.
- If you don’t want to process the sauce, do a small batch that you can use up in a few months.
- If you would like to process the sauce, you can double or even quadruple this recipe with no problem.
- Dice onions very fine. Mince the garlic fine too.
- You can use another vinegar but the red wine vinegar gives the BBQ sauce the best flavor, I have found.
Nutrition
Calories: 649kcal | Carbohydrates: 167g | Protein: 1g | Fat: 1g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Sodium: 210mg | Potassium: 1004mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 159g | Vitamin A: 16IU | Vitamin C: 10mg | Calcium: 185mg | Iron: 4mg
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Do you think it would be ok to sub more honey instead of the brown sugar? Trying to stay away from refined sugars.
It would be absolutely fine to use more honey. It would be a different flavor, but fine.
I’m making notes for next canning season, because this is the only recipe I found that didn’t ask for ketchup and/or tomato paste.
Mods:
Substituted 1 cup honey for brown sugar, used pickled pepper juice (Cowboy Candy) instead of pineapple juice.
7 pint recipe needs 2 tsp salt, 1 tsp black pepper, 1 tbsp paprika, 1.5 tsp mustard, and 3/4 cup AC Vinegar. Added one cup minced apple for body/fruity flavor.
NCHFP recommends water bath 20 min @ 1000 ft.
Next year: use ACV instead of RWV.
Those sound like fun mods. Let us know how it goes!
I’m going to try this!! It looks yummy. Can it be adapted to cook in the crockpot? maybe after its sautéed? Thoughts? I’m very new to cooking . I do plan to water bath can!! 🙂 TIA
It will take a very long time to cook down in a crockpot. You want some of the water too cook out the tomato sauce so that it gets nice and thick. You could certainly cook it in there but you may have still have to put it in a Dutch oven to cook some of the moisture out. Thanks for checking out the recipe Kayleigh!
Thank you so much for replying quickly. Last question, I really want to try it in my crock but I’m very new to cooking, Any estimate as to how long you think it might take? Thanks again!
Unless you take the lid off after it gets hot, you won’t lose the water that you are looking to lose. put the lid on. Get the crockpot hot on high. Remove the lid. Stir it every couple hours so that it doesn’t stick. You may need to replace the lid occasionally to get it back up to temp. Then remove it again. My best guess is at least 10 hours. Maybe more.
My ten year old son just made this for his entry in the best Grilled BBQ chicken contest against his dad. He said he already knows this is the 5 star winner. My hubby seemed nervous because of how good it smells and looks. Lol
Hahaha! You’ve just made my day! Keep me posted on the contest!! Thanks Amber! And thank your son for picking my recipe!
Excited to try this! Just to let you know, you left off tomato sauce on your list of ingredients, in the printable recipe.
Thanks so much Alanna! I’ve corrected that. We love this sauce. I hope you do too!