Sauces, Rubs, and Marinades: What You Should Use And When with Gary Parker

How can you balance the flavors in a marinade or sauce to avoid overpowering the natural taste of the meat? What are some common ingredients or flavor profiles found in rubs, and how do they enhance the meats flavor? All of this and MORE Friday at 4pm!

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:01

Good afternoon, Facebook and Instagram audiences and YouTube. How are you? I'm here with Gary Parker. My name is Jennifer Noreen, and Gary is the Barbecue Pitmaster at Barbecue2U in Gig Harbor, Washington. So how are you, Gary?

SPEAKER_01 0:17

I'm doing great. How are you today?

SPEAKER_02 0:20

I'm great. So Gary's restaurant is on Point Fosdic in Gig Harbor. He has one location. Many wish he had many locations, but he only has one.

SPEAKER_03 0:30

I do.

SPEAKER_02 0:31

And um he's become quite famous locally for his brisket and other southern uh style foods. So Gary, today we're gonna talk about. Do you remember?

SPEAKER_01 0:42

Oh, let's see. Uh rubs, spices, and marinades.

SPEAKER_02 0:46

Sauces, rubs, and marinades. What should I use and when? So these are very formal questions, and Gary's not a very formal guy, so I'm gonna ask him and he'll probably make fun of them, but that's okay. We're gonna get to the reading level. Okay, so what are the key components of a well-balanced barbecue sauce, and how can they be customized to suit different tastes? So some people like sweet, some people like salty, some people don't like sauce at all. So, what are the key components of a sauce? And how do you not overpower?

SPEAKER_01 1:18

For a sauce, it's all about the base, right? There's two kinds of sauces, right? There's thin sauce and there's thick sauce. We use, you know, you know mine is a thick sauce. Um, but you got real watery sauces too that also double, and both of them double as marinades, all right. So if you want to talk about sauce, okay, but it can also be a marinade, and a marinade can also become a sauce, right? Um, but it's the base, right? And so at here at Barbecue to U, of course, we're ketchup based, right? And so we keep the consistency of the tomato paste and these kinds of things, right? To um, you know, that that govern the overall texture of it. And then when it comes to flavor, all right, flavor works the same way with sauces as it does with rubs, and there are five primary components to that, right? Uh, one is sugar, the other one is savory, one is the standout ingredient, one is spicy, and one is salt. And we call those the five S.

SPEAKER_02 2:18

Wow. Okay. Well, tell us about those. So have you made well, tell us how you formulated the sauce that people can find at Barbecue to you.

SPEAKER_01 2:26

Uh well, it it has all those things, but really the story behind the sauce that I uh that I make here in the store is uh is a sauce I discovered from uh a gentleman I once met while I was tooling around uh the uh um the oil rigs and things up in uh North Texas, right? And me and a friend of mine, we were out hanging out with some of these guys, and it was one night and we were cooking up some food next to the oil rig, and uh he came whipped this thing together really quick, and it was so good. Um, that and it was pretty simple because I was able to memorize the recipe that that easily, right? And uh, I've been making it ever since and modifying it ever since, right? And it's it's its base is ketchup, and then there's uh there's key spices in it and a little bit of savory, and there you go. That's what you got. You got sweet and tangy today, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:22

Because I find the sauce at your shop to be a little bit tangy for sure. Tangy, a little bit sweet, yeah. So uh give us the five S's again. That was very interesting.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Okay, you like that? All right, so they are sugar, right? You know, sugar's uh is an obvious one, it puts some flavor into things. Um, it helps um in the rub side, it helps a little bit with bark, you know, when you want to do these things. First of all, it's different, you know, because I only use salt pepper smoke, okay? I don't like making bark out of sugar, um, but a lot of people do, right? And so a lot of their rubs, um, a lot of their rubs will contain a lot of a lot of this fancy stuff, right? And it can make some really great barbecue, right? It's not traditional barbecue, but it's really great tasting barbecue. And we encourage people to do these things with rubs and sauces, and you know, and in the middle between rub and sauce is wet rubs, and we'll talk about that in a second, too, right? Um but uh but they all have the five basic components uh the sugar, the sugar goes in um to create flavor, um, it kind of helps you control your um control your standout ingredient as well as your spice, right?

SPEAKER_02 4:43

Okay, so you said there's five S's.

SPEAKER_01 4:45

So sugar, yeah, that's sugar, and savory. So that's this is the one that gets everybody. What the heck is savory? Right? Savory uh has a definition around it. Um it creates richness in the salt. Um, a lot of times it will um um you can put in for like a sauce, you can put in um wishes sugar or soy, soy sauce. Um and it gives you and it brings up that that richness, that that level of of meaty flavor, right? That'll sit just underneath your your sweetness and your and your spice, right? It rubs um a lot of times it's gonna be your your cumin or your uh garlic powders or your um mustard seed, these kinds of things. These things will these things will add a uh a gluten component into it, and um it will give you this, it'll sit on your tongue, and this was really called savory, like we do. Savory is also a natural occurrence uh to give you a little background on that. That's why this kind of stuff gets confusing because this is chemistry, right? And at a at a certain level, but um um you know when meat gets hot, it produces a glutamate, okay. And in its natural state, without putting anything on on meat, um, you'll taste that rich meat flavor. Take a steak that you grilled, right? Um you didn't put anything on it, you just grilled it, but it's got that real beefy flavor to it. That's that glutamate reaction, right? To heat that that puts that in there. So now bring that up and try to try to duplicate that out in sauces and in uh rubs and these kinds of things. You're trying to add a glutamate in there in order to get the savoriness. I hope that makes sense to people. Yeah, I've never heard of glutamate because without sitting there actually doing it and putting it on your tongue, it's it's kind of hard to explain.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

Yeah, interesting. Wow. So sugar, savory, and what's the next S?

SPEAKER_01 6:40

Uh next S is standout ingredient. All right, so this is the thing that uh what are you trying to do with this particular rub? Right? Do so you know, if do I want to um do I want to make it taste super sweet, right? If I do that, then I'm going to, you know, this is kind of like uh Tennessee, uh Kentucky, you know, they put a lot of um, they use a lot of brown sugar in their rubs, okay? Um because they literally like to get that caramelization, I guess that puts a lot of a lot of meat in there or a lot of a lot of sweet into it, right? And uh candies a lot of things, right? So the extreme of it is is when you candy a piece of meat, right? Um so you know, so your standout ingredient can be a lot of things. Um, it could be um any herb, right? A lot of it is rosemary, a lot of times we'll go in um and and bring in a certain flavor profile. Um trying to think of some of you know, garlic is another one, uh or it could, but it could also be a savory um sharpness, right? I'm trying to think. I don't do a lot of them, so I don't have them all readily on top of my head. I've got them written down in my little secret private book, right? But um from when we play, but you get the idea. Um, so we want to uh so when we have that standard ingredient, it's all about what do you want, what do you want this thing to taste like, right? And so what that's the thing that sits on your tongue, and you say, Oh, I taste the I taste the XYZ, right? Ingredient in this. So that's your that's your that's your superstar. I bet you and the next one you understand, um, it's called spicy, all right. So and there's a difference, right? You can use things you know that are very blended, like cayenne, right? That'll mix that'll mix in really well. Um, you can get extremely aggressive with it with your habaneros and your uh and your jalapenos in some cases, um, chili peppers, those kinds of things, right? Put that spice level in there, you know, and and then you know, but probably the the most important one and the most misunderstood one um outside of the savory is salt, right? Oh, yeah. Salt salt is what really creates the um the chemical reaction with the proteins, all right. At a super high level, the thing you have to understand, or you'll find out when you study this when heat on meat and salt is applied, okay, the protein molecule starts to unravel, starts to un untwist and unravel when salt is applied. All right, and that's why salt can be used as a tenderizer, right?

SPEAKER_02 9:25

Sure, it breaks it down, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:27

It breaks it breaks it out, you know, but that's different than breaking down collagen, you know, and those kinds of things where um that's where we let aging, or we uh as I've told you in here before, we do that with a lot of heat, right? We'll break collagen down that way, but we're not really messing with the proteins, right? Proteins are messed with with the salt, right? And um, and that that works. And I've told you before about how it opens up the pores and how that lets whatever your spice deck, you know, when you're using a using a rub, for example, that's what allows it to go down and penetrate into the meat. So, and that's a and that whole thing has a name, that process, it is called denaturalization, right? And you can look that up and you can read all about it if you're if you're interested, or sometime we can have a show on on just uh denaturalization effects.

SPEAKER_02 10:19

So why did you pick why did you choose to do a sugary sauce in your store? Why did you formulate your sauce and put your name on it? I mean, we have a picture of it here, I can share it. But why did you do the the one that you did?

SPEAKER_01 10:35

Um the largest largest majority of Americans have sweet teeth, sweet teeth. They like sweet, they like hot and they like sweet. I can't do the hot anymore because I usually have this habit of making it too hot and for people, and so to be safe, we uh we don't do the hot one much anymore. We just do the the sweet and tangy.

SPEAKER_02 10:58

All right, well, and then on to the rubs. So are there similar patterns to rubs? I mean, all I know, I know you do a sugar pepper rub, but um tell me about the rubs that you use and what you sell in your store.

SPEAKER_01 11:12

It's the exact same thing, only except you're used in a liquid base, right? So when you do rubs, uh when you when you do sauces, right, you start you're doing a liquid base, right? When you do rubs, you just don't have the liquid base, but you have the spice blends.

SPEAKER_03 11:26

Oh, okay, gotcha.

SPEAKER_01 11:28

It's still the five essence, right? And no matter how you add it up, okay, and then and many times you take the rub and you put it in the you put it in the um in whatever your base is in order to make it, right? So um Texas uh Texas stock. So there's three different real kinds, right? Um, you have the ketchup base, like what I've showed you, there's the Wilcheshire based, which is in some regions of Texas in the south, and then there's the mustard base, right? Um, like you have in the Carolinas, okay. But really, a lot of times it's it's similar things to what you're using in your rub and you're mixing it in with those bases, and um, and you're making a sauce out of it, right? Or you're or going in the reverse, you take the liquid base out and you leave leave a spice deck and you got a rub. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 12:13

So is the difference between your rubs and the sauce, the ketchup or the tomato base that you add?

SPEAKER_01 12:20

Why not say it again?

SPEAKER_02 12:21

Is the difference between your sauce and the rubs that you have in your store this the tomato base that you add to make it a sauce?

SPEAKER_01 12:28

I could, but um, but those are two different recipes in this particular case, right? Um, you know, the the red rub that we use is a um you know it has a lot of sugar in it. It's like we were talking about it, it's got salt in it, salt and pepper in it. Um, it's got a lot of garlic and um oh shoot. Um I don't want to forget one. Um, yeah, we got a lot of garlic and onion on it to in it to to provide the savory side of it, right? Um, and then there's a lot of cayenne pepper in it.

SPEAKER_02 13:05

Okay, so but in general, the ingredients or the components of a well-balanced sauce are these things you see on the screen here sugar, savories, what's your standard ingredient, spicy and salt. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

How can you balance around it? Wait, what it's all based around that for me.

SPEAKER_02 13:21

Yeah, I get you. How can you balance the flavors in a marinade or a sauce to not overpower the natural taste of the meat? I mean, you have fans that are so fanatical about not using any sauce, and then you have fans that absolutely won't eat your brisket without sauce. I'm I'm the latter group. So how do you make a sauce that doesn't ruin all that work you did to get to that wonderful brisket taste? How do you make sure you're not overpowered?

SPEAKER_01 13:47

As a restaurant, I I've basically taken that sauce and neutralized it, right? It's not too sweet, it's not too tangy, it's not too hot, it's it's just it's just kind of this middle of the road thing, right? Um, if I'm a cook, you know, a private cook, or I'm cooking on my back deck, right? I may choose today, I will wake up in the morning and say, ah, I feel like I want more spicy. Oh, I feel like I want it thinner today, or I feel like I want it thicker today, right? And so then, you know, then you're modifying for the cook at that point, right? So it's all about the tongue, and it's all about your mood, right? And what and what you feel like doing today, right? And but you're just moving, you're just moving the quotients of the um um of the salt, peppers, spices, you know, the savories, you're moving them around in different proportions just to make those things pop out. And with a little practice, it's easy, right?

SPEAKER_02 14:42

Yep, yeah, no, it makes sense. So we have a question from Melanie Hambee, and she wants to know do you recommend using tarragon for a steak rub? And if so, what else would you add to make it to make the steak pop? Do you even recommend tarragon or not so much?

SPEAKER_01 14:58

Um well, I'm a little bit out of my league with steak because I don't I don't do a lot of steak, I do a lot of brisket, right? Um, so I have to think about it a little bit. What would I add? Um, because I'm a natural on steak, I'm um I'm just a natural beef guy, right? I I use I use um really just some really basic salt and um garlic and onion, right? If I do anything on a steak, um and then I just get the fire really hot, you know, for steak, and you know, probably cooking you know 700 degrees, that kind of thing. And um, and I'm on it, you know, three minutes, you know, each side and let it rest for a minute and I'm done. Right. I don't do a lot of stuff with um with steak, so I'm not I'm not probably the best person to to ask that.

SPEAKER_02 15:49

Yeah, well honestly, I remember when I first saw you cook brisket and I saw how you spiced it. I thought it was gonna be this five-step process and super complicated. The most you talked about was the the level of coarseness of the salt, and it was basically salt and pepper. And I was like, that's it. And it really is the taste of the meat that Gary's after. It's not a there's not a big magic formula of spices in that brisket. I know because I've watched him make it many times, and that was very interesting to me. It's a very simple bucket of salt and pepper, and it's just rubbing it on it in the right amount. And what is the coarseness of the salt again?

SPEAKER_01 16:22

Is it like salt and salt and the pepper? I do a number 16 um grind on it. Right. And that's not too, I mean, that makes a nice chunk. If you if you remember the um, you remember how I I was explaining to you the you know when the fat melts, you know, it grabs the um it grabs the pepper and pulls it in, right? That salt's breaking down the uh you know the external enzymes, and so that that flavor of that pepper is going down and mixing with the smoke, smoke particle, right? It's been pulled into the meat. And um I'm trying to I'm desperately trying to remember the name of that chemical process that greets the smoke ring, but I can't for the life of me, I can't think of it right now.

SPEAKER_02 17:04

Yeah, we need to do a demo at the store and let people watch you cook this brisket. It's very interesting, it's very uncomplicated around things that you would think would be complicated, and super ridiculously complicated around things that you wouldn't even think about, like the wood. The wood is shipped to Gary from Texas, you know, the temperature, the how long he cooks it, those are all somewhat standard, but there's some very interesting things that Gary does when he cooks his brisket.

SPEAKER_01 17:30

Um that's all about managing these chemical processes. Um, it's it's really kind of an interesting science. The guys who have spent the time to break this down, right, to understand what's happening at molecular levels and documenting it, it's really kind of fun.

SPEAKER_02 17:46

Yeah, it is. It's very interesting. So, what's your recommendation if someone wants to buy barbecue sauce or rub for the first time? So it let's say at barbecue to you, let's say we we go to your display cabinet and they look through what you have. What are your best sellers and why do you think that is? And if someone's just getting started buying something, what would you recommend?

SPEAKER_01 18:06

Well, um, first thing is to be to understand what your what your taste is, right? Um some people, for example, they like a heavy, heavy hickory, right? Um flavor. Everybody, everybody likes hickory, and uh because it's the it's the quintessential barbecue flavor, right? And so a lot of people, a lot of guys will make that. Um understanding your spice levels, right? What do you like, you know, understanding how how um how savory you want that that sauce or that rub to be.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

Sure, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:39

Um, you know, and um you know it's an interesting question because it's really all about taste.

SPEAKER_02 18:46

Yeah, it's what you like and what you know your family will like and how spicy they'll take their meat and all.

SPEAKER_01 18:51

And and by the way, you know, what you like today, you may want something different tomorrow. Yeah, that's one of the really cool things about barbecue, is there is no bad barbecue, and if you're doing it for yourself, you make it to what you want it to be, right?

SPEAKER_02 19:03

Right, of course, yeah. So it's customizable.

SPEAKER_01 19:06

Yeah, those flavors can be wonderful, and you know, except and I want to be I want to say this over and over again because guys like me, I'm uh understand I'm a restaurant and I'm doing in the restaurant one particular uh type of barbecue that is representative of you know the the mid-1800s in central Texas, right? That's what I'm making, right? But and we're gonna do that every single day because that's our taste profile, that's our brand, right? That's what we're doing. Um, but if I'm over on my deck, you know, and then I'm like everybody else, today I I want I want sweet, you know, tomorrow I want spicy, the next day I want savory. Maybe I'm gonna throw a maybe I'm gonna throw a herb or something in it and get a little bit different twang to it. Maybe I'm gonna put some citrus towards it, right? Um, and and so far we're just talking about beef in this.

SPEAKER_02 20:01

We hadn't even begun to talk about pork, chicken or turkey or pork or sausage.

SPEAKER_01 20:06

Yeah, because under these same rules, we can start talking about things like um pork tenderloin, right? Who is a very dry piece of meat. So then we build injections, right, with this stuff. So now we take these flavor profiles and we start mixing them in with apple cider vinegar or uh or orange juice or these kinds of things that are very acidic, right? And now we start injecting them right into what would otherwise be very bland pieces of meat, like like pork tenderloin, for example. And pork tenderloin and um pork shoulder are two extremely different flavor profiles in what they do. So the pork shoulder doesn't need it because it's got so much fat, fat gives you savory, so you don't have to do anything. The tenderloin has no fat, so you've got to inject it, or it's gonna be a very dry, bland piece of meat. So, you know, we talk about marinades and we talk about, you know, and that's one thing marinated. You know, when you thin all this stuff out and um and you put it in a baggie, and then you let that let that piece of piece of pork sit in there overnight, right? The enzymes are doing the same thing, right? It's kind of a denaturalization uh context, and it sits there and opens up the the marinade soaks into that otherwise bland piece of meat, right? And then you when you go put it on the grill, you're cut you're cooking all those sugars and everything into it. So now suddenly pork tenderloin has this beautiful flavor robust flavor that you never thought it could have, right? So injections are also another another aspect of this whole topic.

SPEAKER_02 21:39

Well, we uh Melanie is telling us that we're making her hungry by showing all these pictures. So that's exactly what we want to do, Melanie. We want you to get in your car and drive the barbecue to you right now and order. There you go. So isn't that what we're you know trying to do? No, trying to have some fun. So yeah, so um this is really a complex topic.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

So I hope you and I'm kind of just them across the top of the waves at best, right? Maybe this is something I'll put in the book one day if I ever get the time to sit on it, write all this stuff down.

SPEAKER_02 22:07

Yeah. She says fat gives you savory. And she said that's my biggest takeaway. And that's very interesting to know. So because it melts down the context of the meat and puts savory into the meat. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01 22:19

That's the most that's the most fundamental form of of a um of of the glutens, right? It's within the meat itself. And so what so when when heat and meat come together that gluten is released. And that's that beef flavor there beef flavor or pork flavor that you that you that you so remember or understand right.

SPEAKER_02 22:39

Yeah so when you do a burnt end or is that a different rub that's just your basic salt and pepper rubber it's just the way the meat is cooked. Is that right?

SPEAKER_01 22:47

Yeah we're just all all you're really doing on the burnt ends these days is you're cutting the shark fin off and we cube it up and we just coat it the same way we do the overall brisket.

SPEAKER_02 22:57

But being smaller um they cook a lot faster right they you know you don't go through all the heat phases and stuff and it's only one um um you know since it only comes off the um the point um then um you know it don't it has all that fat in it so it um a burn in will cook more like the way we make them they'll cook more like a prime rib than they will a a brisket right yeah all right well very informative thank you for all of that and uh for those of you that want to watch this again or get the information we do post all the videos on the website so you'll find it there in the next day or so um all of our we have a huge video library on all different kinds of barbecue topics from Gary on YouTube. YouTube channel is super easy to cruise through and find what you want to watch.

SPEAKER_01 23:43

But we always wrap up with some chat about philanthropy and kind of what else you're up to Gary so can you uh tell us uh what what are you up to as far as philanthropy going this week and uh let's see what we got going on right now we've got uh gig harbor volleyball uh on the counter takeover they were a kickoff they've been there two weeks and um um so they're just about to finish up and I highly encourage everybody to come in and give me their receipt um this team uh is a fantastic team there's not a lot of budgetary dollars for them and from what I've learned from from talking to the leadership um and uh so that's why we we extended them for a second week right um so they're trying to buy uniforms and do all these kinds of things and you know and we want to give the we want to give the kids the most opportunity they can so um so they're in right now uh starting next week uh starting next Monday um koanas will be in the social club koanis will uh will be taken over the counter and they'll be in the store doing different things and a lot of those guys are also the guys and gals are also some of the authors that uh that hang out uh and and sell books um we're getting ready to remodel the author's corner this is interesting um so we're getting rid of the tables and stuff that are behind the author and we're about to go in and put uh bookshelves all back there so they can um so we can have a more of a little library look oh nice fun like a reading corner almost yeah but we're gonna put a little bit of investment in that I mean and since it's lasted now three and a half years it's um you know it's probably time to uh give it a little bit of a facelift right and help the authors out a little bit yeah um what else are we doing uh we're still doing the movies and the bingo yep so next week uh the 29th is our um free senior movie day and uh that'll be fun I'm also this week um you'll notice over if you go to the Good Harbor Film Festival for those of you guys that are local um uh I sponsor theater number four over there so you'll see the all the barbecue to you logos and stuff like that happening if you uh happen to go there and tomorrow would be a really good day to go because it's gonna be rainy here and so what a what a great day to go in and watch some of these X Men films.

SPEAKER_02 25:55

Very cool.

SPEAKER_01 25:56

And then I feel like there's something we're not thinking of well maybe not oh yeah what's going on with catering so catering catering is kind of shifting um we uh you know usually middle as I've told you before the middle of September you know the big weddings and a lot of that kind of stuff are all gone now. Um end of summer parties are over now. Um so now we're getting back into um some of the more formal things you know some of the corporate lunches into your lunch or banquets and stuff stuff we're we're getting ready to ramp on um the next part the most important one coming up is uh we're starting to ramp now for November 11th which is veterans day right so we've got we've got several uh several organizations that we're partnering up with on that one um and then no sooner than we get up get done with that um we got turkey back so the pre-orders for turkeys are back this year um supply chain has figured it's figured itself out and we can now feel comfortable taking orders and that you know that we're not gonna call you late and tell you no all right so um so yeah remember we just do breasts we don't do whole birds and um and so you can you can yeah you can bring those turkey shots up um we can either slice it like you see in that picture or what we prefer to do is we prefer to deliver it um as one whole chunk so that you can pick it up early put it in your oven on um and just warm it up on uh Thanksgiving day so slice that on your own so it doesn't dry out so it doesn't dry out you know because once that once that outside outside um skin is on there that will hold all the moisture and butters and everything in that in that turkey for you and you need to order early if you want turkey right and catering in general car key to you as is a daily you know the daily rush to get your food in general you just have to order early you have to you know email Gary or call Gary now if you want something in the next you know after the next month or so it just he's always booked so um anything else you want to share before we wrap up Mr. Pocket I think we're good. You know come in and support the kids as much as you can support the authors as much as you can and um and just do good things.

SPEAKER_02 28:08

Yeah sounds good thanks Gary we'll talk again.

SPEAKER_01 28:11

All right see you later by