Head Country Sauce Clone

[Smoothsmoke]

I'm not having any luck on finding a clone recipe to Head Country original or hot. Or a basic bbq sauce recipe that I can tweak? Any Brethren have such a recipe they can share? TIA

[rweller]

Why do you need to clone it, just buy some and enjoy. Thats why they sell it.

[Smoothsmoke]

Originally Posted by rweller

Why do you need to clone it, just buy some and enjoy. Thats why they sell it.

Plenty of people make their own sauce. I'd like to do the same in experimenting on sauce making and if I can manage to make one like H & C, great. I love Head Country, have a few bottles in my fridge.

[BlueHowler]

You might try to do a "reverse engineering" thing. It may take quite a few times but I'll bet you will come close or create a sauce you like even better.

When I want to make a sauce like something I like that is commercially available I first read the ingredients list on the label. The ingredients are listed in order of volume i.e. if the first ingredient listed is catchup and the second is brown sugar then you know that those are the two main items to start with. You can go from there to find the other ingredients.

I'd also recommend training your taste by tasting a lot of spices just by themselves so that when you taste a sauce or rub you have a good idea and starting place to build the flavors of what you want to create.

There are a ton of BBQ sauce recipes that you can Google and when you find one that has a very similar ingredient to the sauce you want to clone you can experiment with the flavors until you have something you like.

[Smoothsmoke]

Originally Posted by BlueHowler

You might try to do a "reverse engineering" thing. It may take quite a few times but I'll bet you will come close or create a sauce you like even better.

When I want to make a sauce like something I like that is commercially available I first read the ingredients list on the label. The ingredients are listed in order of volume i.e. if the first ingredient listed is catchup and the second is brown sugar then you know that those are the two main items to start with. You can go from there to find the other ingredients.

I'd also recommend training your taste by tasting a lot of spices just by themselves so that when you taste a sauce or rub you have a good idea and starting place to build the flavors of what you want to create.

There are a ton of BBQ sauce recipes that you can Google and when you find one that has a very similar ingredient to the sauce you want to clone you can experiment with the flavors until you have something you like.

Thanks! I've thought of that regarding rubs, but most just say sugar salt and spices. Who knows what the spices are. But it never occurred to try it with sauces. Thanks again! BTW, I'm not trying to sell my own sauce or anything like that. Just for my personal use, hate paying 10 bucks in shipping for a bottle of sauce. If this thread is in bad taste, I ask that the mods please remove it.

[BlueHowler]

Here are the ingredients as I found them on the internets which may or may not be correct.
Tomato Ketchup (Red Ripe Tomatoes, Distilled Vinegar, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Corn Syrup, Salt, Onion Powder, Spice, Natural Flavoring)Brown Sugar, Distilled Vinegar, Worcestershire Sauce (Distilled Vinegar, Molasses, Corn Syrup, Water, Salt, Caramel Color, Garlic Powder, Sugar, Spices, Tamarind, Natural Flavor)Liquid Hickory Smoke, Salt and Spices.


The ingredients in the parentheses are the ingredients in the previous ingredient.


Natural flavor is going to be harder to discover this is the definition of natural flavor;




The exact definition of natural flavorings & flavors from Title 21, Section 101, part 22 of the Code of Federal Regulations is as follows:
"The term natural flavor or natural flavoring means the essential oil, oleoresin, essence or extractive, protein hydrolysate, distillate, or any product of roasting, heating or enzymolysis, which contains the flavoring constituents derived from a spice, fruit or fruit juice, vegetable or vegetable juice, edible yeast, herb, bark, bud, root, leaf or similar plant material, meat, seafood, poultry, eggs, dairy products, or fermentation products thereof, whose significant function in food is flavoring rather than nutritional."
In other words, natural flavors can be pretty much anything approved for use in food.



This is where your taste buds come in.

[PatioDaddio]

There's a reason why they make cloning difficult.

I've come up with a thinner version of Blues Hog that is so close that fellow
competitors can barely tell the difference on ribs, but I'll never let the recipe
out "in the wild" because I don't want to take revenue from Bill Arnold. It's
his sauce, and that's the way it should stay. It was just a personal challenge
for me.

Reverse-engineering is your friend.

John

[Spruce-Ridge-Smokers]

Originally Posted by Smoothsmoke

Thanks! I've thought of that regarding rubs, but most just say sugar salt and spices. Who knows what the spices are. But it never occurred to try it with sauces. Thanks again! BTW, I'm not trying to sell my own sauce or anything like that. Just for my personal use, hate paying 10 bucks in shipping for a bottle of sauce. If this thread is in bad taste, I ask that the mods please remove it.

There is certainly nothing wrong with aspiring to make you own sauce; perhaps the problem lies in your apparent desire to simply "clone" a successful commercial sauce rather than pay the maker for it. (i.e. if you can't make something truly better, why bother?)

Just a thought ...

[bigdogphin]

And not all Ketchups are the same...I took a tour of their facility its quite impressive. Head Country is our favorite sauce as well.

[QDoc]

Walmart and Sam's sell Head Country by the gallon way cheaper than you can make it.

[CajunSmoker]

Originally Posted by QDoc

Walmart and Sam's sell Head Country by the gallon way cheaper than you can make it.

Do they still carry it in Pine Bluff? last time I went to buy some it had been replaced with gallons of Cattlemans.

[LTG]

I would start with a base of cocktail sauce because that is what it tastes like to me.

[River City Smokehouse]

I have been making sauce for 15 years, and my suggestion is to not use someone Else's sauce (clone or not) to develop your own. Your own sauce may take years for you to come up with. I started by learning to make homemade ketchup and went from there. I've thrown out a lot of sauces in the past years, and tasted just about every sauce on the market and then some. I have a thing about trying to make something that is like someone Else's. At the end of the day I can say that my BBQ tastes like my BBQ. My sauce, my rub. The people who I sell my stuff to are winning comps, so my years of trial and error have paid off.
If I want to taste some Head Country, then I'd buy it. One of their main ingredients is liquid smoke. That stuff has so much liquid smoke in it, it could kill a mule.
Take the time to come up with your idea and recipe. You'll be more proud of it. Good Luck!

[Smoothsmoke]

Originally Posted by QDoc

Walmart and Sam's sell Head Country by the gallon way cheaper than you can make it.

Not in So Cal. Only mail order for now.

[Smoothsmoke]

Thanks everyone. I found a basic sauce recipe called #5 that I'm going to try and tweak to make it my own.

1 cup ketchup
1/2 cup cider vinegar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon worchestershire sauce
1 tablespoon rub

Seems pretty simple, basic, and it appears that I can add more ingredients to make it my own distinct flavor (hopefully similar to Head Country)