Guava Barbecue Sauce Recipe

RECIPE: Drunken Guava Barbecue Sauce



Our Guava Tree

Our guava tree is heavy with fruit.  When I let the bulldogs out this morning, there were dozens of guavas which had bombed to the lawn.  The birds had already had their share of the ripe fruit.  So I picked some of the ripe ones off the tree, literally the low-hanging fruit. Sweet Michael gathered the higher ones later.  He came into the kitchen with his hands full and then started emptying his pockets of sweet heavy guava. My dear farmer. 

The guavas were washed, ready for mashing.  These guavas have a lemon yellow skin with pink pulpy flesh.

 .

The pulp is pureed in the food processor and then pushed through a strainer 

add onion, garlic and ginger...puree is cooked down to thicken

 

DRUNKEN GUAVA BARBECUE SAUCE



 



 

3/4 cup guava strained puree (about 10 guavas)

1/2 " ginger -grated

4 cloves garlic

3 TB chopped onion

1/4 cup cider vinegar

1/4 cup tomato paste

1/4 cup Honey Whiskey (I used Jack Daniel's Tennessee Honey Whiskey)

3 TB freshly squeezed lime juice

1 TB soy sauce

1 TB molasses

1 TB brown sugar

1 TB honey

1 tsp worchestershire sauce

1 tsp crushed red pepper

1/4 tsp dry mustard

 

Wash and dry fresh guavas. Cut in half and place in hinged juice press. Scrap pulp into food processor.  Process and transfer pulp into fine strainer, press puree into bowl.  Measure to 3/4 cup of puree.  In food processor pulse grated ginger, garlic and onion.  Add garlic mixture to guava puree.  Cook down until reduced slightly and thickened.  Bring to a low boil.  Add rest of ingredients and cook doen until desired BBQ sauce consistency.

 

 

 



Salt Water Therapy

Salt Water Therapy

Here is the recipe for a perfect day in May.  Get up early; push off urge to sleep in on this Sunday morning; remind yourself there will be ample nap time on the stern of the boat.  Grab your giant L.L. Bean Boat & Tote (READ embroidered in pink, matches the handles, natch!) Try to remember where you left your favorite swim suit…oh yeah, it’s still in the suitcase you took for the Waikiki staycation last weekend, no time for swimming last week- it was a just in-case packed item.  Gather your sunscreen buffet, all the SPF numbers represented; seventy for the responsible grownup, screen in the hot pink bottle that smells like an orange push-up, sixty-four screen in a small fancy silver and gold package with discreet font that makes me feel fancy, baby screen for the “won’t sting your eyes” feature and don’t forget my personal all-time favorite, Coppertone in the traditional brown bottle-for the girl I return to when my toes hit the sand.  If there were a scratch and sniff label to the summers of my childhood it would be the comingled delicious scent of Coppertone and sea spray.

Fill the tiny cooler cube with water bottles and ice.  Food will be purchased at the wiki-wiki (Hawaiian for quick and slang for a convenience store).  To the tote add, in no particular order: boat shoes , cotton polo, sunglasses, a visor that you should probably toss but you love it and rationalize the hoarding of it to its new duty as Official Boat Visor, hair clip to let you enjoy the fast ride and forget about your wind whipped locks, current paperback but not a precious one you want to hold onto after it’s finished, your second string reading glasses…disappointment but no real heartbreak if they get lost or damaged, and three towels.  Why three towels?  Ladies like to wrap themselves in one towel which leaves a towel each for me and Sweet Michael.

Pack the car with our tote and cooler. Sprinkle in happy mornin’ banter…if I was the slightest bit musical I would compose a bouncy little chantey: yay yay it’s a boat day, hurry hurry gotta get on the bay…I’m adding learn to play the ukulele to my bucket list right now.  Is it too late to become the female version of Jimmy Buffett??? Next stop, snacks and such from the convenience store.

I know, I know…Linda, you love to cook why are filling up the cooler with convenience store snack junk?  Because it’s easy and adds to the happy child feeling walking briskly through the aisles and adding crackers and bottled sweet tea to my handbasket.  When I was a little southern girl, the bright orange crackers with peanut butter meant you were traveling; they signal adventure. They’re called NABS (short for Nabisco?...even though the manufacturer can vary. I seem to remember Lance was a familiar brand name).  I haven’t lived in N.C. for more than a decade but I would imagine that there are still folks my age when invited to go on a any kind of trip will say, “Super, let’s hit the road but Sugar, can we stop at the stop-n-go to snatch up some Nabs and a Pepsi first?”

Here’s the salt water therapy regimen.  Put boat in the water. Sweet Michael does the engine work and I run the lines off the dock.  It takes about 15 minutes to get to the sand bar.  Pull up on the mauka (mountain side) cuz the side closest to the base has the partiers.  They pull up there boats so they’re touching. We like the quiet side, yep we’re old cranks. I’ll write the etiquette of the sandbar in a future post.  Okay, back to the agenda:  Anchor. Have breakfast (usually a Subway flatbread sandwich: egg, pepperjack cheese, bacon, spinach, tomato and spicy mustard).  Gather and slather sunscreen. Quick swim. Get in floaty chairs and wait for the tourists to disembark from their various pontoon boats.  (that’s another post too!) Back on boat. Sweet Michael goes down into the cabin.  If it’s Sunday, he calls his parents. And he naps and  I pull out my book, read for an hour.  Then I nap.  As it gets close to four in the afternoon, the negotiation starts. Me, “Let’s stay ‘til 4:30” Him, “Babe, we need to get it in, hose it off, trailer it back up…”  of course we stay until 4:30.  It is the happiest seven hours of my week.  It rejuvenates and replenishes my soul. Find your happy place and don’t forget your sunscreen.

Aloha Y'all: The Lone LemonJust one lemon. Onelemon. My tre...

Aloha Y'all: The Lone Lemon

Just one lemon.  Onelemon.  My tre...: The Lone Lemon Just one lemon.   One lemon.   My tree looks like a Charlie Brown Christmas tree with a lone yellow ornament. I had vision...

Aloha Y'all: The Lone LemonJust one lemon. Onelemon. My tre...

Aloha Y'all: The Lone Lemon

Just one lemon.  Onelemon.  My tre...: The Lone Lemon Just one lemon.   One lemon.   My tree looks like a Charlie Brown Christmas tree with a lone yellow ornament. I had vision...

Aloha Y'all: Potluck? No Thanks-

Aloha Y'all: Potluck? No Thanks-: Okay, here goes.   I hate Potlucks. I know your mama says hate is a bad word; but I HATE potlucks.   Really.   I can’t get over it.   I envi...

Aloha Y'all: 10.01.2011

Aloha Y'all: 10.01.2011: A Boat, A burn and A ball We walk into our house, being met with the welcome smell of something Italian cooking. And being the lone cook ...

Aloha Y'all: Aloha Y'all Launch

Aloha Y'all: Aloha Y'all Launch: This is it; the launch of Aloha Y'all. I am staying up way too late because I have to be at work in seven hours.  The show should be startin...

Aloha Y'all: Potluck? No Thanks-

Aloha Y'all: Potluck? No Thanks-: Okay, here goes.   I hate Potlucks. I know your mama says hate is a bad word; but I HATE potlucks.   Really.   I can’t get over it.   I envi...

The Lone Lemon

Just one lemon.  One lemon.  My tree looks like a Charlie Brown Christmas tree with a lone yellow ornament. I had visions of my kitchen counter  crowded with  woven baskets spilling over with bright yellow sunshine balls, still warm from the afternoon sun.  Nope, just one lemon. But I am still grateful for the one lemon.  Did I tell you there’s only one lemon?

But there is a gravitas to what to do with the one lemon.  My first thought was to make a bold mouth-puckering cocktail.  Would that be special enough to celebrate this lovely lemon? Squeeze every ounce of the juice, mix it with a simple syrup add vodka, shake, spill the liquid sunshine into a chilled martini glass rimmed with lemon sugar.  AIn’t one thing wrong with that.  But one cocktail, and by one I mean one for me and one for Sweet Michael, didn’t seem squeeze worthy.  Please remember this the next time you’re filling up the produce bag at your supermarket, this lemon took almost a year from bloom to ripe.  A year.  And this only child lemon has not had a moment of privacy.  Every morning while I am making my morning tea, yes dear, sweet tea, I peek out my window and make sure the lemon is still hanging out on the end of the branch.  This is not citrus OCD, I have to check each morning and evening because the lemon tree’s neighbor is a guava tree which right now, looks like some scary Tim Burton harvest.  The birds love to feast on the guavas but apparently, the feasters do follow the stereotype of eating like a bird, leaving half of the fruit.  So the lemon has been spared from the guava marauders. 

Tart sweet cookies or a cake would seem to fulfill the destiny of this lemon.  But with only one lemon (remember?)  there is simply not enough juice. And I would feel awful if I dishonored the fruit by blending with store-bought lemons.  Yes, that sounds like total citrus snobbery and I’m going to own it this time.  There is a definite lemon hierarchy with the homegrown lemon sparkling at the very top.

But I can’t get my mind off of baking with the lemon.  So I remembered a southern lemon cake with a thin lemon-powdered sugar  glaze.  This cake was more of a  coffee cake baked in a loaf pan.  With the additional tartness of added buttermilk , to compensate for the one lemon, this lemon loaf was a sweet success. So let me leave you with a little southern thought for the day; when life hands you lemons, squeeze a wedge into your sweet iced tea and count your lucky stars you can call yourself a southern gal!