Good Eating Monday: Barbeque Sauce

Today we're going to talk about barbecue sauce---the bottled kind you buy. Do you read the ingredients before buying?  I used to buy what was cheap---usually the Kraft, but then I started reading the ingredients and noticed the first ingredient on the Kraft bottle and several other brands was corn syrup. You know, Karo. It's not that corn syrup is bad. You want Karo when you make a pecan pie.  No, my only concern is corn syrup is just plain o' sugar and I don't want to buy a bottled sugar.

Besides, reducing sugar intake is being encouraged nowadays, since type 2 diabetes is directly related to obesity. So changing to a bottled barbecue brand to something without corn syrup on the ingredient list could be a good move.
Of course, I realize you can make home-made barbecue, but I like the convenience of ready-made.
I buy Bull's-Eye Barbecue because the first ingredient on the list is tomato puree.
Other ingredients include vinegar, molasses, mustard powder and spices. Yes, a bit of sugar, too.
Regular, not corn syrup. But if you know anything about cooking with tomatoes, you know a bit of sugar is a required ingredient---it reduces the acid taste common to tomatoes. When I'm making soup or sauce or anything from either fresh tomatoes or even plain canned tomatoes, adding a couple teaspoons of sugar it the secret ingredient.

I noticed the Tennessee style Bull's-Eye has additional brown sugar, so I chose the

 Kansas City style, which doesn't have the brown sugar this time. It tastes just as good.

Recipe of the Day:

Barbecue Sweet Potato and Sausage Over Rice

(This recipe is for 2)

Ingredients

1 med large fresh sweet potato, peeled, cut into half-inch discs, then sliced into quarter-inch strips.

1 Hillshire Farm Smoked Hardwood Chicken Sausage, cut in half, slice, halve slices. (Or any smoked sausage.)

1 med onion, sliced in long, quarter inch slices.
1/4 of a head of cabbage, sliced.

1 clove garlic, minced

1/4 cup dark raisins (you can substitute a cored & sliced apple if you don't care for raisins.)

1/2 cup Bull's-Eye Barbecue
1 to 2 teaspoons honey

1 Tbsp Olive oil

Steamed Rice
Your favorite brand of cooking spray

Directions:
Cook your favorite rice. Meanwhile, add olive oil and minced garlic to frying pan over med heat. Saute garlic in olive oil lightly to flavor oil briefly. Then add sweet potato strips, stirring often, spraying with additional oil spray as needed, until browned and beginning to get tender. Now add sausage & cabbage. Cook until cabbage begins to wilt, then add onion and raisins. Keep stirring until onions are transparent. Add the honey to the barbecue sauce, give a stir to mix, then pour over sausage/sweet potato mix and stir until thoroughly coated. Turn to simmer and let sauce get hot a couple minutes, then serve over rice. Delicious!