Charcoal Meat Lipstick

There was an awful lot of excitement in the CountryWoodSmoke Facebook Group when Jess Pryles’ new BBQ rub Hardcore Carnivore Black arrived on these shores. For anyone not aware of her, Jess has shot to BBQ fame an Aussie living the BBQ life in Texas, and founder of the Australasian BBQ Alliance. This is one of her new rubs, the other being Hardcore Carnivore Red. The first of these rubs, the black version arrived at Great Outdoors BBQ Co. in Northern Ireland and they kindly sent me a tub to review.

As I like to do with dry rubs, I tried a little straight from the tub, the dark black colour from the charcoal makes for a very striking colour to the rub. Upon tasting, the first and biggest hit was garlic, then a taste I couldn’t quite pin down, perhaps from the charcoal, or the subtle spices. I decided to try on some venison steaks to see how it performed on a strong tasting red meat. I sprinkled the rub over the steaks and cooked quickly on a high heat direct over hot charcoal. The rub responded really nicely to the heat, probably a mix of the charcoal and sugar forming a lovely bark very quickly. The bark worked really well and the flavour of the garlic was lessened upon cooking, it was very delicious and worked really nicely. I’m looking forward to trying this rub on some more dark meats such as short rib and hanger steak, which I think it will work particularly well on. I look forward to further experiments.

Contact Roger Allen at Great Outdoors BBQ Co. for more details and availability.

I was sent the rub to try for free, but was free to give my opinion in this review.