What Sauce On Your Bacon Butty? (Bacon Connoisseurs’ Week)

Whether you call it a butty, sarnie, bap or barm, cob, sanger or piece ‘n’… I’m sure most of us can agree that two pieces of bread with heaps of bacon piled between makes a beautiful snack for any time of the day.

What we’re less able to agree on is the sauce. Lines are drawn and knives too, as we battle over whether tomato ketchup, brown sauce, mustard or even mayonnaise is the optimum partner to cured porky deliciousness.

As this week (19-25 March) is Bacon Connoisseurs’ Week, I accepted an offer from Tracklements, purveyor of very find condiments, to try their tomato and brown ketchups for myself.

From my larder, I pulled out one of my stash of their sweet mustard ketchup, a condiment of such intense sweet sharp flavour that you’ll be hooked the moment you taste it, just as I was last year.

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We most commonly buy Denhay Farms bacon, also sold as Waitrose own label, Duchy Originals and Spoilt Pig. I’ve also noted the finalists of the bacon awards, and shall be seeking out some of these to try soon.

 

Tracklements

What I most like about Tracklements is their dedication to traditional recipes, often gleaned from tattered old cookery books and tweaked until perfect, and their commitment to using high quality, natural ingredients, grown locally as much as possible.

After an unsuccessful a search for an accompaniment to the sausages he was tasked with selling back in the early seventies, William Tullberg decided to create a traditional mustard himself, to fit the bill. He soon found there was a demand from friends, local pubs, shops and restaurants and set up his own business to supply it. Today, the company is run by his son Guy, and has expanded the product range to sell many more mustards, chutneys, relishes, sauces and ketchups.

The reason their products taste like home made is that they are made using the same methods as you’d use at home, as I discovered for myself when I spent a day learning how they made mustard (and having a go myself) last year.

 

The Sauces

Fruity Brown Ketchup – a gentle, sweet sour brown sauce without the harshness of smell and flavour that some cheaper brands have.

Tomato Ketchup – similarly gentle to the brown sauce, but a step too far, I found myself wanting a punchier kick such as Heinz tomato and balsamic ketchup or Levi Root’s Love Apple tomato ketchup and my own home-made spicy tomato ketchup.

Sweet Mustard Ketchup – a truly fantastic balance of sweet, sharp, tangy mustard in a sauce format.

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On our bacon sandwiches, we both agreed that the sweet mustard was the winner, though my home grown spicy tomato is a pretty close second!

 

Recipes

My grandfather’s recipe for spicy tomato ketchup is here. I’ve made this with both red and green tomatoes, adding a little more sugar to the green ones to balance their extra acidity. Both have proved very popular with friends.

Brown sauce is very similar to Indian tamarind chutney, what I refer to as tamarind ketchup. My mum’s recipe is here, and this has also proved really popular with friends.

Tracklements recipe for their fruity brown sauce is also shared on their blog, here.

 

Kavey Eats received a complimentary sample of Tracklements tomato and brown ketchups.

Please leave a comment - I love hearing from you!
24 Comments to "What Sauce On Your Bacon Butty? (Bacon Connoisseurs’ Week)"

  1. @milliepaw

    Brown sauce. I have a really intense dislike of tomato ketchup, even seeing the words makes my skin crawl.

    Reply
  2. Kathryn

    An excellent excuse – if I needed one – to have plenty of bacon this week!

    Tomato ketchup all the way for me.

    Reply
  3. @dehyphenlish

    excellent choice, don’t mind the red and the brown but can’t beat the diversity of mustard based condimentification

    Reply
  4. Catherine

    Not actually a fan of bacon sandwiches. I want to to be, God how I want to be. They smell so good, but am always dissappointed, I just taste salt. However, no sauce would be preference although sometimes the red stuff can assist matters. The Tracklements mustard sauce is a new one on me, so am off to get a bottle

    Reply
  5. Jo Romero

    These sauces sound great…I like the sound of that sweet mustard one! I love brown sauce in a bacon sandwich, but mixing mustard and ketchup together and slathering in a bacon sarnie is my favourite at the mo!

    Reply
  6. Casey

    My other half swears by Tiptree Hot Mango Sauce on his bacon *batch*. #coventry

    Reply
  7. Mr Noodles

    Ketchup. HP is also acceptable. But mayo? Mustard? Not with a bacon sarnie. Oh, and btw, a bacon sarnie has to be served with soft bread imho.

    Reply
  8. kaveyeats

    Agree on the soft bread, has to be proper soft, no crunchy crust, and white, definitely white!

    Would always have thought of ketchup or brown sauce but since I got this sweet mustard a year back, it’s my first choice with bacon, with lots of things, actually.

    Like the ideas for mango sauce and for onion chutney (via twitter)…

    Reply
  9. Squonky

    I have to say I like the sound of that mustard sauce, but for me it has to be HP. Usually “original”, sometimes “fruity”.

    Reply
  10. Jacqui M

    Tomato ketchup if the bacon sandwich is on white bread, and HP if it’s on brown bread.

    The other way round doesn’t work for me I’m afraid!

    Reply
  11. Simon

    Used to be a HP kind of guy, but now I always have my bacon with just a little bit of Holy F*** sauce from the Rib Man, adds a nice bit of heat

    Reply
  12. Rachel K

    Just to throw a spanner in the works, I love Worcestershire Sauce. So I’m guessing that in a pinch it’s brown sauce all the way!

    Reply
  13. Richard

    I like daddies brown sauce, I also will not say no to a bit of branston either. But tomato ketchup is a big no-no far too sweet!

    Reply

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