From California to Maine, Kansas to Texas and all the way down to Florida, many Americans will have their smokers and BBQ grills out over the coming weekends. It’s football season, it’s that time of year!
If baseball is America’s pastime, football is truly America’s passion and nothing symbolizes this more than barbecue. Whether tailgatin’ at the stadium or grillin’ on the patio, football and BBQ go together like ham and eggs.
It’s hard to watch TV without being pulled to the food channel like a moth to a flame where someone is whipping up something delicious. With reality shows like BBQ Pitmasters, where contestants compete against each other to see who cooks the best barbecue, it’s easy to see why barbecue is taking the nation by storm. Many times the competitions come down to less than a point between first and second place. What seems to separate the ultimate champion from the others is their flavor profile. The judges simply like the way one tastes over the other. And that is all about the sauce.
Tom Gates has been making his own personal barbecue sauce (flavor profile) for over 40 years. It started when Tom first started entering barbecue competitions. He explains “It was cool to make your own sauce and the winners typically did.” He started out in his kitchen, stirring up the magic. It would take Tom and his wife Josie four hours just to prepare the ingredients that would go in the pot. Tom laughs, “We always had a pot of sauce bubbling on the stove.” With a career in sales Tom traveled many places for his job. Before leaving on these trips he would bottle up his perfected recipe in mason jars and take it with him for his customers. The sauce became such a huge hit with his customers that he had to purchase a 5 gallon pot just to keep up with the demand! What originally started as a jar here and there quickly turned into requests for cases of sauce. Tom’s son, Tommy, was the one who came up with the idea to start selling the sauce. Tommy and his sister Tiffany put their heads together and that’s where the name “Mack Daddy’s Hawg Sauce” was created. With much of the country worried about what they are consuming and becoming more heath conscious overall, Tom decided to reformulate his sauce to an all-natural recipe. The sauce is now gluten free, MSG free and contains no high fructose corn syrup, which now makes it guilt free! It’s better than it ever was, but don’t take my word for it. Mack Daddy’s Hawg Sauce was awarded a second place “Award of Excellence” by the National Barbecue Association (NBBQA) in the “Tomato Mild” category.
Tom’s delicious barbecue sauce is not his only invention. Years ago at a cookout, the menu for the afternoon included blackened redfish. As Tom was prepping the fish he realized he was having a hard time keeping the blackener/cast iron skillet hot enough to cook more than a couple fillets at a time. This gave him the idea to create a blackener that held heat longer which lead to him designing the Mack Daddy’s Blackener. This is a double thick extra heavy cast iron skillet made by Lodge Manufacturing, the oldest premier cast iron cookware manufacturer in the US. It now comes pre-seasoned so you can start cooking with it right out of the box and I can testify it makes some of the best baked potato’s you will ever eat! Tom is an inventor whose ideas come from his love of great food and bringing people together to share in this experience. If you have the pleasure of meeting Tom and spending time with him you will also come to realize that his passion for his business is centered around his family and sharing what they enjoy with others. For more information and locations to purchase Mack Daddy’s Hawg Sauce and the Mack Daddy’s Blackener visit them online at www.Mackdaddysinc.com.
[easy-social-share]