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What makes BBQ Sauce authentic?
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Written by: Thor
I was in a pub earlier, having a meal with some members of my family - fish and chips, thanks for asking - and the table had, with its salt and pepper shakers, two large plastic condiment bottles. One was vaguely browny-red and the other a sort of reddy-brown. "Tomato Ketchup" one was proudly labelled, but the other was "Authentic BBQ Sauce". Which got me thinking...what makes BBQ sauce authentic?
I honestly have no idea. With a name like BBQ instead of barbecue, it surely has no right to be an authentic anything. Perhaps it was the same exact sauce that is used by the Barbecue Standards Authority or some other half-baked (ho, ho) quango. Maybe it uses the recipe voted as the most something or other...OK, I have no idea. But to me, this is only half the problem. Because it only raised another question: if the BBQ sauce is authentic, then why isn't the ketchup?
Maybe the BBQ sauce was authentic in being actual barbecue sauce - and the tomato ketchup is actually made out of people? This, I realise, is a bit of a fantasy. (Although, if subsequent investigation discovers that tomato ketchup is secretly being made by NAMBLA...then let Dan Brown know, because he might be low on ideas.) But seriously, is the ketchup less "authentic" than its barbecue cousin? And if so, what possible reason could there be?
I think that the pub was getting snobby. BBQ sauce is barely acceptable, but maybe ketchup is the last straw. In a final effort to prevent its consumption, the overzealous publicans have tried to diminish its respect by not calling it authentic. I admit that this theory is only slightly more believable than the soylent green rip-off, but it's the closest I've come to an answer. Anybody got any ideas?
Labels: authenticity, BBQ sauce, ketchup
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