Enough for about 1kg of meat
Total time 10 min
This is the one I keep coming back to, and it has never once failed to please a table. I have used it on most things and it works on all of them. Chicken wings and beef short ribs are my favourites. It is just as good slow cooked as it is roasted, and it does not need hours sitting in the fridge to do its job.
Ingredients
- 340g tomato paste
- 110g (½ cup) brown sugar
- 60ml (¼ cup) apple cider vinegar
- 3 tsp Worcestershire sauce
- 4 garlic cloves
- 1 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp pepper
- 60ml (¼ cup) olive oil
Equipment
None
The Simple Process
- Prep: Peel the garlic.
- Mix: Put the tomato paste, brown sugar, vinegar and Worcestershire sauce in a bowl. Press in the garlic, then add the cayenne, salt and pepper. Stir until the sugar has dissolved and you can no longer feel grains.
- Loosen: Stir in the olive oil a little at a time until the marinade is smooth and glossy, and thick enough to coat the back of a spoon rather than run off it.
- Taste: Adjust the salt and cayenne to your liking. It should taste sharper in the bowl than you want it on the meat, because the sweetness comes forward once it hits the heat.
- Marinate: Coat the meat all over, using your hands to work it into every surface, and leave it in the fridge. Half an hour is enough and an hour or two is better. How long depends on what you are cooking, but a paste this thick sits on the surface rather than soaking in, so there is little to gain by leaving it much longer.
How to use it
Grill, roast or slow cook. Whichever you pick, the flavour comes from the heat rather than the time in the fridge, so this is not a marinade that needs planning around.
Watch the sugar. It caramelises and then burns, so keep the heat moderate for most of the cook and leave any searing until the very end. On a long slow cook, check it more often than you would with a plain rub.
This marinade keeps about a week in the fridge in a sealed jar, since the garlic in here is raw, and it freezes well, too.
