Basic elements of a rub


 
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Steve Petrone

TVWBB Diamond Member
The simplest rub is salt & pepper. Sugar seems to be the next most common ingredient. Then chile pepper(s). Garlic & onion.
Now it get tricky: spice
thyme, oreganno, cummin, celery, fennel, sage, coriander, dill, sage, bay, rosemary, margoram, mustard, basil, curry...KK has many more.

How few ingredients can you use to make a rub with complexity?

I'll take the first shot.

Salt, pepper, chile pepper of your choice and, celery seed.

Texans might argue for cumin, Italians for fennel and Greeks for oregano.

What do you think?
 
Steve, my basic brisket rub. Sea salt or Kosher salt, course ground pepper, onion powder, garlic powder.
 
I'm not too interested in how few ingredients I need--mostly because I have access to so many--but I don't think lots of ingredients are necessarily necessary.

If I was required to skimp--
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--then I'd start with Paul's version but it would be salt, green pepper, garlic and onion.

I'm not big on all that much sugar and use paprika only as a carrying agent; not often. I do like other ground chilies in rubs because they work so well but don't always use them--it depends on the direction I'm heading with sauces and sides.

I infrequently make rubs that don't include at least a couple herbs and usually 2-3 additional spices. I'm looking to highlight, boost, contrast and complement the flavors developed in and on the meats during cooking. These include the obvious cooked meat flavors but also the dozens of flavors created through caramelization on the meats surface (of the meat and the rub), and the flavors imparted by the smoke if I am using smokewood.

My biggest gripe with commercial Q places--and, for that matter, with most steak houses and numerous restaurants when it comes to the prep and serving of many grilled meats--is that the results are often so boring. Two bites and I'm ready for something else. I do not feel that a properly blended rub properly applied (this is critical) masks the flavors of the meat and dispute the notion--it's my opinion of course--that salt-and-pepper-only or minimalist rubs are better. They might be if the meat is meant to be sauced a bit, or there are other complementary flavors going on with the sides, but I do not care much for barbecue that must be sauced and I find the simple-to-no-rub approach horribly lacking. (This is common in many places but most notably central Texas. The meats are often perfectly tender but the flavor is flat and one dimensional to me. Most are salt-and-pepper-only places.) I love sauces and love to make them but, in barbecue, I like the meats to stand on their own first (and to me this requires a good rub) and then the sauce(s) to work with the results on the plate. In non-barbecue--say a dinner of a grilled steak, a roasted lamb loin, or a duck breast grilled to med-rare--then my rubs tend to either be less invloved or more lightly applied, or both, as I'll be focusing more on the sauce and sides as the flavor complements but this isn't always the case.

I know I might be out on a limb here and that many might disagree but, frankly, I have never had anyone tell me that they would have preferred the grass-fed filet I just served them (or the bison rib-eye, or the spare ribs, or the chuck, duck or brisket) to have only salt and pepper. Depending on what I am cooking and what I want the results to be on the plate I might make a rub more involved or less, I might apply more rub or less, but I'm always going to rub!

Enough of my rambling. I am not of the one-rub-fits-all mindset and prefer to make specific rub blends specific to the meat I am cooking and the result I want to achieve (and apply the rubs accordingly), but were I to be on a desert island with a cooker, fuel and all the meats, but only allowed the least in the way of rub ingredients then the following would be my hope: salt, pepper (probably green), garlic, onion, thyme, marjoram, aleppo or hot New Mex chile, coriander, clove, allpice, cumin, ginger and bay. I would hope that the island god would alow me to mix in the amounts I prefer, perhaps eliminating one or another depending on the meat I was cooking but if it didn't--or if I had to cut the list dramatically--I'd likely pull a Geraldine Page in Woody Allen's 'Interiors' and walk out into the ocean and drown myself.
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Kevin, I noticed you left out Tamarind. Any reason why? Where can you pick up ground Tamarind? Does it come in just a paste? I've looked everywhere. It's a long process to make it myself.
 
Paul--

I would hope that there would be tamarind trees growing on the island!
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You are quite correct that it is one of my favorite flavors to use--either in glazes or sauces or pastes or as a juice to include in a braising mix--but, alas, it is best used fresh or from concentrate (pomegranate, another favorite, is the same in this regard). A powder is available (it can be hard to find but some Indian markets carry it) but I don't find it does all that well as an direct ingredient in a dry rub. When I want to include tamarind in the flavor profile, however, I'll make a glaze and apply it over the meat's surface just before it comes off the grill or out of the cooker. It seizes and sets in moments. Though I prefer fresh pods or a concentrate, the powder can be useful in liquid blends (like sauces), to flavor soups or bases, or in places where one would normally use pulp, but as pods are so readily available I use the pulp most often. I do make or purchase tamarind concentrate which I carry with me on the road (pomegranate 'molasses' too) as in some places it can be harder to find, but with the Hispanic diaspora tamarind pods aren't as hard to find as they once were.
 
When I wrote that I was referring to using dried herbs in dry rubs. For typical barbecue (well, typical for me anyway), I almost always include thyme and, depending on the meat and the sauce I'm planning, will include one or more of the other herbs, often marjoram and/or bay and/or (again, depending on the meat/sauce) sage, Greek oregano, savory, et al.

I do make paste (wet) rubs with fresh herbs but often use dry igredients in paste rubs as well--makes them pastier--and often I used dried herbs for this. Often I use pastes alone but I sometimes apply a paste rub thinly to meat (large cuts like chuck roasts, butts, fresh hams, lamb legs, somerimes briskets) and then add a dry rub over it.
 
My questioning here and in the onion / garlic question is asked so that those who have more to learn, like me, can master each ingredient, each flavor. Then when we grasp each individual element, we can better predict those combinations that Kevin and others so artfully prepare and suggest.
Layers of flavor do seem to be superior to the simple. If we can master the simple then we can better master and understand these more complex combinations.
One reason I try the simple combos is after studing 'championship' rubs or sauces, one can find themself adding the the whole spice rack... One sauce I put together had 22 some ingredients...I wonder how many could have been left out.
Another reason I try few ingredients , is to encourage those who don't make their own rub or sauce to try one.
Great rubs or sauces can add a lot of flavor that you can't add any other way.

Kevin you always seem to offer the ulitmate flavor combos. Your dissertations teach most all of us something new. Going mimimalist must be like taking your tools away!
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> Another reason I try few ingredients , is to encourage those who don't make their own rub or sauce to try one. </div></BLOCKQUOTE> And I applaud that effort heartily. One does not need lots of ingredients.
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> My questioning here...is asked...to learn...each ingredient, each flavor. Then when we grasp each individual element, we can better predict those combinations... . </div></BLOCKQUOTE>And that is the best way to go about it.
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Layers of flavor do seem to be superior to the simple. If we can master the simple then we can better master and understand these more complex combinations.
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>I think they are (though not always and not for everything). But the sum of the layers shouldn't knock you over the head, shouldn't obscure the key element--in this case the meat. Complexity doesn't have to mean impenetrable, esoteric or enigmatic. Complexity can be very accessible; can seem lucid and clean.
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> I wonder how many could have been left out. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>Probably many.

I think music or, more specifically, music composition is a good metaphor for cooking. A melodic line might be simply sung by a singer (a slice of perfectly ripe tomato) or the singer might be accompanied by a piano (the tomato with a little balsamic; grilled steak with salt). But one can add to the composition, bring in other instruments; a few perhaps, or guitars, a bass, a whole string section(!), horns, drums. The melody or theme is still there (one hopes) but the song, the music, is fuller, richer. Individual instruments can likely be removed, one could do without the horns (maybe just keep the sax), the strings could be reduced or cut entirely, and the song will still be the song. It's a matter of personal preference, how you want it to be heard by your audience, how you want it to feel.

Like music, where not all of us like the same tune and mood helps to determine what we feel like listening to at the moment, so too with food. Sometimes we might want something simpler or we might not have enough time for anything more involved. Often, for me, I want a symphony on a plate--but not always: sometimes I want the entire meal to be the symphony, each course perhaps simple or only somewhat complex, the sum of the courses being the entire composition. Like music, cooking a meal has so many possibilites. It's infinite. And just like how understanding how different instruments sound, what their ranges are, how they can be played, how they work with other instruments, how soft or how loud they can be, so too with understanding ingredients. And that, for me, is the pleasure of cooking.
 
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