This copycat recipe for Tony Roma’s Blue Ridge Smokies sauce is fantastic. It has some of your ‘standard’ BBQ sauce ingredients, such as ketchup and brown sugar. Those aren’t what made it so special to me. It’s the red wine vinegar. The vinegar really adds a nice edge to the sauce. It’s like a nice combination of a KC BBQ sauce with a little North Carolina vinegar-based sauce. This is a great finger-licking sauce that screams ‘put me on a rack of smoked ribs’. So that’s what I did!
This sauce is great on anything smoked or grilled. So make plenty extra. Oh and you bet it’s great on wings too! Grilled, deep-fried, air-fried, doesn’t matter. BBQ sauce on wings is great!
The Perfect Sauce For Ribs
My first experience at Tony Roma’s was in Salt Lake City, Utah. Many, many years ago. I instantly fell in love with their ribs. Ribs, ribs, ribs. Tony Roma’s started my love of ribs and I now make them often at home on my own smoker. I rubbed a rack of ribs down with a copycat Famous Dave’s rib rub, let it get happy overnight, then tossed the ribs onto my Weber Smokey Mountain smoker for 6 hours. I then slathered on some copycat recipe Tony Roma’s Blue Ridge Smokies sauce. The end result was tender, tasty, and finger-licking amazing.
Spicy Tony?
If you want a little heat to your BBQ sauce it’s easy enough to add it. You can go the hot sauce route. I’d use a classic hot sauce, and not one that is going to really fight with the rest of the flavors of the sauce. Frank’s RedHot or Cholula would be my recommendations. You can also use cayenne pepper. Or for a smoky spicy twist, use chipotle chile powder.
- Heavy-duty BBQ Basting Brush by HQY – Silicone…
If you don’t like liquid smoke, substitute smoked salt and leave out the Kosher salt instead.
Try my copycat Tony Roma’s ribs made on the Char-Broil Big Easy.
Tony Roma’s Blue Ridge Smokies Sauce (Copycat Recipe)
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 cup ketchup
- 1 cup red wine vinegar
- ½ cup brown sugar I substituted Sugar in the Raw
- ¼ cup molasses
- 1 ½ teaspoon liquid smoke
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper
- ¼ teaspoon garlic powder
- ¼ teaspoon onion powder
Instructions
- Place all ingredients in a saucepan over medium-high heat.
- Bring to a boil while stirring constantly.
- Reduce heat to a simmer and simmer, stirring often, for 30 minutes or until desired consistency is achieved.
- Sauce gets better when refrigerated overnight. Warm slightly before using.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutritional values are approximate.
