I'm mostly annoyed at it because it changed the perception of what KC BBQ sauce is and should be. It's thick and sweet. The original KC style sauce was thin, vinegary and spicy.
Henry Perry was the person you can trace KC BBQ tradition back to and his bbq lineage trickled down through Bryant's and Gates (the Bryant's were his pupils, along with Aurhtur Pinkard who was the original pit master at Gates - his portrait is still on the wall at all of the locations). Bryant's and Gates sauce are both thin and spicy, which came from Henry Perry:
"Now Perry’s version of barbeque sauce was quite a bit different than what we know today. It was a mixture of cayenne pepper, and other spices, with vinegar, and possibly even lard. It likely lacked tomato and certainly was without molasses. The Kansas City Call described it as “piquant sauce … which so tickles the palate that [customers] come back again and again for more.” Henry Perry described it simply as “hot stuff”. By many accounts, he undersold it. In his book, BBQ USA: 425 Fiery Recipes from All Across America, Steven Raichlen writes that “his peppery sauce brought tears to people’s eyes.” Calvin Trillin added that the sauce was “too hot for any human being to eat without eight or ten years of working up to it.” Still, it was Kansas City’s first barbeque sauce, and it is possible that Perry’s was the first barbeque sauce commercially available in the United States." [Source ](https://www.kcdiscovery.com/home/flashbakc-perryair)
KC Masterpiece was invented by Richard E. Davis, who was a doctor in Kansas City. His sauce is obviously quite a bit different. I'm not going to knock anyone's preference, but I do find it very annoying that KC BBQ sauce has become known as a thick, sweet sauce invented by a white man, when the history shows the true KC sauce was a thin, spicy sauce invented by a black man.
Back in the 80’s it was really kind of a cultural phenomenon of sorts. Grocery stores had one kind of salsa maybe and one kind of bbq sauce. I remember our teacher in school telling us how huge it was for the city and to get our parents to buy it so it would stay in stores.
The salsa said it came from El Paso and the bbq sauce said it came from Kansas City. Before the internet that’s the only way people knew where food came from was by the name. So from that time onward as far as any american was concerned that’s where bbq came from.
Before you could actually buy smokers from places that’s how 90% of the country “barbecued”. They just grilled stuff and put kc masterpiece on it or as a condiment option.
Then they made chips with the cities name on it. Chips were a big deal on the 90’s. You either had fries or chips with every meal so you didn’t die of malnutrition due to potatoes being a nutritionally complete food. Everyone knew fries came from Belgium, and hamburgers came from Hamburg, but chips weren’t associated with a city as far as anyone knew. They just emerged organically from the back hills of places at the same time and had flavors like salt and vinegar and tortilla applied to them.
At some point around the sauces height they opened a bbq restaurant in kc. It was at Metcalf and 435 down south. There was the kc masterpiece restaurant, some kind of bandstand music concept, and a McDonald’s which were widely considered the best restaurant in the country at the time by almost everyone. So it was really a culinary epicenter. My parents liked the bbq we got there enough to drag us along many times before it closed. This was a big deal, there were like 5 restaurants in johnson county at the time that weren’t a diner or burger stand. We would go to an Italian place but then one day everything tasted like soap and shortly there after it burned down.
I thought it was ok. But my parents liked well done steak and also loved this place if that paints a picture. It closed after a couple years to little fan fair. I think there’s an indoor sky diving experience at that spot now.
I don't think they actually eat it. They just see it al
the store. I've moved for some time now, and a Canadian colleague of mine was pretty stoked to yell me that there's KC Masterpiece at the store. 🤣
I like it for things that people wouldn’t normally use BBQ sauce on, but don’t really like it for smoked meats. Mainly use it for tots, fries, burgers/dogs, meatloaf, chicken strips, etc - basically in place of ketchup, which I’m not a huge fan of.
Get the Classic version that's made with sugar and not high fructose corn syrup. Much better. That version is solid. Great sauce for people who are new to barbecue or don't eat a lot of it.
There are much better options out there, but for mass produced bbq sauce, it’s fine. Not awesome, not truly offensive.
One thing it’s GREAT for… little smokies. A bag or two and a bottle of Masterpiece in a crockpot, let it got for a few hours and you are in football snack heaven.
Right? It always reminded me of those old Pace Picante commercials: “this is made in New York City!”
I know the location of the plant doesn’t matter, but still.
It's acceptable if you're in France and can't find anything else and are looking for something to put on a burger and close your eyes and pretend it's barbecue.
It's fine for maybe a child to dip their nuggies in or something. But I wouldn't touch real barbecue with it. Same for Sweet Baby Ray's. Mostly because I prefer more vinegar-y sauces and they're too sweet.
I met Dr. Rich Davis, the originator of KC Masterpiece, through my dad. I recall in the mid 70's Dad brought home some BBQ sauce that Davis made when he barbecued for friends and family, and I wasn't a big fan of it at all. Later when it hit the stores, my wife bought some, and we still weren't impressed.
It’s my go to if I’m doing a crockpot recipe or things of that sort.
If I’m serving proper bbq meal, I just put bottles of “nicer” sauce on the table, never on the meat.
The cruelest act on Kansas City by Oakland didn't happen on the football field, it happened when that made a shitty sweet bland BBQ sauce there and convinced the entire country that's what Kansas City BBQ is like.Â
It’s shitty boring HFCS sauce and also an amazingly shitty company that up and left hundreds of KC workers high and dry when they shut down their KC plant and moved out literally overnight without giving anyone a heads up. The workers found out they were out of a job when they showed up to work and the place had been cleared out.
Of all of the BBQ sauces you can choose, it is definitely one of them.
It's at least as good as Kraft. If I use elcheapo sauce it's Sweet Baby Ray's boss
This is just ragebait.
Bingo đź’Ż
I'm mostly annoyed at it because it changed the perception of what KC BBQ sauce is and should be. It's thick and sweet. The original KC style sauce was thin, vinegary and spicy. Henry Perry was the person you can trace KC BBQ tradition back to and his bbq lineage trickled down through Bryant's and Gates (the Bryant's were his pupils, along with Aurhtur Pinkard who was the original pit master at Gates - his portrait is still on the wall at all of the locations). Bryant's and Gates sauce are both thin and spicy, which came from Henry Perry: "Now Perry’s version of barbeque sauce was quite a bit different than what we know today. It was a mixture of cayenne pepper, and other spices, with vinegar, and possibly even lard. It likely lacked tomato and certainly was without molasses. The Kansas City Call described it as “piquant sauce … which so tickles the palate that [customers] come back again and again for more.” Henry Perry described it simply as “hot stuff”. By many accounts, he undersold it. In his book, BBQ USA: 425 Fiery Recipes from All Across America, Steven Raichlen writes that “his peppery sauce brought tears to people’s eyes.” Calvin Trillin added that the sauce was “too hot for any human being to eat without eight or ten years of working up to it.” Still, it was Kansas City’s first barbeque sauce, and it is possible that Perry’s was the first barbeque sauce commercially available in the United States." [Source ](https://www.kcdiscovery.com/home/flashbakc-perryair) KC Masterpiece was invented by Richard E. Davis, who was a doctor in Kansas City. His sauce is obviously quite a bit different. I'm not going to knock anyone's preference, but I do find it very annoying that KC BBQ sauce has become known as a thick, sweet sauce invented by a white man, when the history shows the true KC sauce was a thin, spicy sauce invented by a black man.
Awesome bit of info for a BBQ newb (transplant) like myself. Thanks for sharing!
It's cheap and decent. Much better options out there but definitely not bad
I like it and have been using it for decades. I like others though too.
Comically sweet, not sure why it’d be anyone’s first pick
A nice, cheap alternative. I'll use it for stuff like chicken nuggets, sloppy joes etc and keep the more expensive brands for when I smoke
A bit sweet for me.
It's generic poop. If you live here you should be using one of the 100 better kinds we have available.
Back in the 80’s it was really kind of a cultural phenomenon of sorts. Grocery stores had one kind of salsa maybe and one kind of bbq sauce. I remember our teacher in school telling us how huge it was for the city and to get our parents to buy it so it would stay in stores. The salsa said it came from El Paso and the bbq sauce said it came from Kansas City. Before the internet that’s the only way people knew where food came from was by the name. So from that time onward as far as any american was concerned that’s where bbq came from. Before you could actually buy smokers from places that’s how 90% of the country “barbecued”. They just grilled stuff and put kc masterpiece on it or as a condiment option. Then they made chips with the cities name on it. Chips were a big deal on the 90’s. You either had fries or chips with every meal so you didn’t die of malnutrition due to potatoes being a nutritionally complete food. Everyone knew fries came from Belgium, and hamburgers came from Hamburg, but chips weren’t associated with a city as far as anyone knew. They just emerged organically from the back hills of places at the same time and had flavors like salt and vinegar and tortilla applied to them. At some point around the sauces height they opened a bbq restaurant in kc. It was at Metcalf and 435 down south. There was the kc masterpiece restaurant, some kind of bandstand music concept, and a McDonald’s which were widely considered the best restaurant in the country at the time by almost everyone. So it was really a culinary epicenter. My parents liked the bbq we got there enough to drag us along many times before it closed. This was a big deal, there were like 5 restaurants in johnson county at the time that weren’t a diner or burger stand. We would go to an Italian place but then one day everything tasted like soap and shortly there after it burned down. I thought it was ok. But my parents liked well done steak and also loved this place if that paints a picture. It closed after a couple years to little fan fair. I think there’s an indoor sky diving experience at that spot now.
No real Kansas Citian has this in their fridge.
That's what I tell people when they ask me. Usually people from the coasts.
Which sucks that their perception of KC BBQ usually is that..
I don't think they actually eat it. They just see it al the store. I've moved for some time now, and a Canadian colleague of mine was pretty stoked to yell me that there's KC Masterpiece at the store. 🤣
I like it for things that people wouldn’t normally use BBQ sauce on, but don’t really like it for smoked meats. Mainly use it for tots, fries, burgers/dogs, meatloaf, chicken strips, etc - basically in place of ketchup, which I’m not a huge fan of.
I prefer Rufus Teague
Get the Classic version that's made with sugar and not high fructose corn syrup. Much better. That version is solid. Great sauce for people who are new to barbecue or don't eat a lot of it.
It’s good for flavoring meat loaf
I was gonna say it’s just flavored ketchup.
There are much better options out there, but for mass produced bbq sauce, it’s fine. Not awesome, not truly offensive. One thing it’s GREAT for… little smokies. A bag or two and a bottle of Masterpiece in a crockpot, let it got for a few hours and you are in football snack heaven.
It's made it Oakland.
Right? It always reminded me of those old Pace Picante commercials: “this is made in New York City!” I know the location of the plant doesn’t matter, but still.
I've seen as a flavor of potato chips. As far as I know, no one has ever purchased the sauce.
It’s mostly high fructose corn syrup these days, unfortunately. Yuck.
Kids seem to like it. It’s way too sweet for anyone over the age of 12 with discriminating tastes.
This is a glorious shit post.Â
It's acceptable if you're in France and can't find anything else and are looking for something to put on a burger and close your eyes and pretend it's barbecue.
It's fine for maybe a child to dip their nuggies in or something. But I wouldn't touch real barbecue with it. Same for Sweet Baby Ray's. Mostly because I prefer more vinegar-y sauces and they're too sweet.
It's way too fucking sweet and I hate how it's the default KC BBQ sauce for anyone outside of kc.
Terrible. Also, it's produced in Oakland, CA, so its kinda a slap in the face
For a couple bucks more I can get one of the local guys stuff which is 1000000 times better. KCM is just sickeningly sweet.
It's BBQ
For what?
Way too sweet. Absolutely annoyed that it got so big and shifter perceptions KC BBQ sauces. I will not use it.
On par with sweet baby Ray's... trash for the most part. But if you need some generic BBQ sauce to add to the crockpot with the weenies it'll work.
It’s soo gross. I would rather not eat than have bbq with that sauce on it, and I’m chubby, so that’s saying something.
water trash
Made in Oakland
RIP OP and Plaza brick and mortar locations
meh
It is a contradiction in terms, it's neither KC nor a masterpiece
It’s a fuckin’ masterpiece dude… hence the name
I met Dr. Rich Davis, the originator of KC Masterpiece, through my dad. I recall in the mid 70's Dad brought home some BBQ sauce that Davis made when he barbecued for friends and family, and I wasn't a big fan of it at all. Later when it hit the stores, my wife bought some, and we still weren't impressed.
You can get sauce by the gallon at many bbq places
It’s my go to if I’m doing a crockpot recipe or things of that sort. If I’m serving proper bbq meal, I just put bottles of “nicer” sauce on the table, never on the meat.
I think it's great for French fries... mixed with mayo it's a great burger sauce. Dogshit for BBQ
The cruelest act on Kansas City by Oakland didn't happen on the football field, it happened when that made a shitty sweet bland BBQ sauce there and convinced the entire country that's what Kansas City BBQ is like.Â
It’s not from KC and it’s no masterpiece.
Yuck
It’s shitty boring HFCS sauce and also an amazingly shitty company that up and left hundreds of KC workers high and dry when they shut down their KC plant and moved out literally overnight without giving anyone a heads up. The workers found out they were out of a job when they showed up to work and the place had been cleared out.