Easy Homemade BBQ Sauce Recipe: made with Beer and Molasses this sweet BBQ Sauce is a favourite. Perfect with any kind of bbq meat.

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Sweet Bbq Sauce
Simple Ingredients
Lager Style Beer
Can We Use A Different Style Of Beer Or No Beer?
Gift Giving
Recipe
More Recipe Inspiration

This Homemade BBQ Sauce recipe is worth the effort. A family favourite we make all the time. It's a sweet one, so perfect for anyone who likes a bbq sauce a little on the sweeter side. And it's made with simple ingredients, so pretty easy to make anytime. It's sure to become your favorite bbq recipe.

I’ve applied a fair bit of research to this and can say with confidence, homemade is always better. Think about it…homemade flavoured marshmallows, check. homemade flatbread crackers, check. BBQ Sauce….check!

Sweet Bbq Sauce

There's all different kinds of bbq sauce. Some are spicy, some are smokey, and some like ours are on the sweet side. I love a slightly sweet delicious sauce. It has complex flavors and layers of tangy molasses, sweetness, and spice. The addition of the beer to this bbq sauce adds a depth of flavor to it. And I think it's a perfect pairing with just about any grilled meat including chicken, beef, or pork tenderloin or pork chops, and of course pork ribs.

It's made with beer and molasses, and gets it's sweetness from that and the honey, apple cider, and the ketchup in the recipe. One of the great things about a sweet bbq sauce is that the sugar in the recipe will caramelize a little on the grill. Don't put it on your meat too earlier or it will also burn. But added near the end of cooking time, it will just start to caramelize in places and a real depth of flavor and sticky sweetness and tang to whatever you are bbqing. This flavorful sauce also has the perfect amount of tang and sour, and spice to balance out the sweet and make it our favorite sauce.

I'm not a big fan of smoky bbq sauces and tend to stay away from recipes that add in liquid smoke. I think grilling outdoors is a great way to add the smokey flavor in a natural way. If you do love smokey bbq sauce, you could certainly add some in.

Simple Ingredients

One of the things I also love about this beer barbecue sauce recipe is that you can put this together with simple ingredients you probably already have on hand in your pantry. And if they're not in your pantry you can easily find them at the grocery store.

Lager Style Beer

Use your favourite lager style beer as the beer style in this recipe for homemade beer bbq sauce. The lager beer adds a carmaley, barley based sweetness balanced with the perfect bitterness. The flavor of the finished sauce is complex and rich and that's why we love this beer bbq sauce recipe. We made ours with Red Stripe because we had it on hand, and it was delicious.

Can We Use A Different Style Of Beer Or No Beer?

If you don't have a lager style of beer of hand and you want to substitute it in this recipe you can. A dark beer or malty beer like a Guinness is a good choice too. A guinness bbq sauce will a have a darker color and taste a little heavier, more bitter, with a real depth of flavor. If you're not a beer aficionado you can even skip the beer altogether and go for something like wine, apple cider or even soda. This recipe has a ½ cup of apple cider already in it, so ¾ cup of apple cider and skip the beer if you like. You might like trying root beer barbecue sauce if you're looking for a non-alcoholic option this bbq season.

Gift Giving

This is my sister-in-laws recipe, and it’s worth the effort. We tasted it for the first time at a family bbq and asked for the recipe because it was so good. I also thought it would be the perfect Father’s Day gift. It's especially perfect wrapped up with a nice steak. I can't think of a better way to celebrate the Father in your life.

This sauce is perfect for gift giving. It would also be a great hostess gift. Everyone always loves a homemade food present.

Homemade BBQ Sauce with Beer and Molasses

This homemade sauce will keep for for several weeks in the fridge, stored in an airtight container. We like to store it in canning jars in the fridge. You can see exactly how much of this amazing recipe you have left.

This good sauce is sweet and tangy. The beer and molasses make it rich, tangy, delicious. It's such a great bbq sauce to use with any grilled meats, and one of my favorite beer recipes to make in the summer.