10 Store-Bought Steak Sauce Brands, Ranked Worst To Best

To sauce your steak or not? That is the age-old debate. Purists believe that a well cooked, properly seasoned steak doesn't need a sauce. Others will disagree. Personally, I fall somewhere in the middle. I will admit that I prefer a good dry seasoning (Montreal Steak Seasoning is my go-to), and as my family will attest, I sometimes go a bit overboard. The point being, I like a good flavor with a bit of a kick. If that is enhanced by a sauce, then I will use it. 

A good sauce can help elevate steak, and not all of us have time to whip up a homemade sauce. This is why we took a look at some of the most common store-bought steak sauce brands for this ranking. Specifically, we were looking for the best sauces to elevate the taste of your steak.

Steak sauce has been around for ages. The brown sauce that most Americans are familiar with actually started in Britain in the 1800s. It was a blend of molasses, apples, tomatoes, dates, tamarind, vinegar, raisins, and spices. Most brands today still include vinegar, tomato paste or puree (or both), as well as salt and spices. Ultimately, it's up to you whether you use a steak sauce, but to help you along, here is our ranking of 10 store-bought steak sauce brands.

Walmart's Great Value Steak Sauce definitely falls under the more traditional sauce category. It's a dark brown sauce that includes crushed oranges, tomatoes, vinegar, garlic, and other spices. It says that it's good for all cuts of steak, as well as burgers, pork chops, and chicken. It comes out of the bottle a bit fast and runny.

When tried on its own, the very first thing to hit your tastebuds is the vinegar. It's incredibly sharp and definitely lingers to the point that you don't get a lot of other flavors in there. It takes a few tastes to start to get a hint of pepper, garlic, and any of the other spices they've used. When paired with your protein, again, that vinegar lingers a bit too long — it gets caught in the back of your throat. Even if you cook a restaurant-quality steak at home, this sauce is going to overwhelm all your seasonings.

It's at the bottom of this list since it's a bit too sharp to really complement the tenderness and natural slight saltiness of your protein, and that's a cardinal sin when it comes to steak sauce. You want something that blends with the steak and seasoning, not completely drowning it out.

I was honestly excited to try Guy Fieri's Flavortown Secret Sauce. While it's mostly advertised for burgers, chicken, and other dishes, it does claim to be for "everything" — I thought this would be perfect to use on a steak. The bottle describes the sauce as a creamy aioli with chili powder, a subtle hint of mustard, and garlic. This sounded like something right up my alley, as I enjoy a good creamy, garlicky sauce. I thought it would be a good departure from the more traditional, vinegar-heavy brown sauce.

That very first taste of just the sauce built my hopes up. It has a nice tangy zest, and you can definitely taste the mustard, garlic, and aioli. I tend to go a bit more peppery with my steak, and I felt like this would be a great combo to play up the seasonings I used. Unfortunately, once I tried it together, my hopes were dashed. When put on a steak, the sauce was so subtle that I almost wasn't sure it was there. I tried again, putting even more sauce on the meat and thinking maybe I just didn't use enough, and it was the same thing.

Secret Sauce doesn't really complement the flavor of the meat, but it also doesn't detract from it, which is why it's toward the bottom of my list. You want a sauce that you can taste without smothering your steak in it.

London Pub Steak & Chop is another more traditional brown sauce. The London Pub is a British brand focused on traditional British condiments like malt vinegar, so I had some high standards in mind before trying. The British invented brown sauce, after all. Ingredients include sugar, vinegar, malt vinegar, tomato paste, molasses, apple puree, Worcestershire sauce, and other spices. It's a pretty dark sauce with a good consistency that can be used for dipping or as a marinade.

The first taste, with only the sauce, you definitely get the vinegar and Worcestershire. However, then the savory blend of spices comes in and tones it down enough that you can start to get hints of the tomato. I was a bit disappointed that you couldn't really taste even a whiff of the sweetness, even though it has sugar and molasses. When paired with steak, it has a nice tanginess to it, though you still get more of the sauce than the meat.

Overall, while it's not outright bad, it also didn't really stand out either. It might be a good sauce to use with a flavorful cut that won't break the bank. I'm not sure I'll give it another try, though.

This next entry is definitely different from other sauces on the list. In fact, it's on the other side of the steak sauce spectrum. While Dawn Fresh Mushroom Steak Sauce is also a brown sauce, it has a mushroom base and lacks the strong acidity of vinegar-based sauces. Ingredients include mushrooms, flour, salt, tomatoes, onion powder, and beef stock. Not only can you top your steak with it, but you can also use it as a base for meatloaf or roast or put it on your hamburger.

Now, I'm a big fan of mushrooms and steak. Even without including a sauce, I'm no stranger to topping my sirloin with mushrooms sauteed in butter, so I was looking forward to testing this out. It's very creamy and rich on its own and comes with chunks of mushroom, which is a big plus in my book. There's no zest or spice, but that's not a bad thing. It blends very well with the steak, especially with a nicely seasoned cut.

Overall, it's a good basic sauce that can stand on its own and enhance a juicy steak. However, if you're looking for a sauce that has kick to it, this is going to taste bland.

Budget brand doesn't necessarily mean bad. The next sauce on the list is Best Choice Original Steak Sauce, which comes right in the middle of our ranking. It is another brown steak sauce that has the traditional ingredients: tomato puree, vinegar, salt, raisin paste, garlic, onion, and a blend of spices and herbs. It's a little bit on the thin and runny side, but the consistency doesn't affect the taste.

Alone, the flavor is not super vinegary. It's more subtle than some of the other brown sauces on the list. When paired with steak, especially when cooked using the rule of threes, it lights up. The subtleness of the flavor works really well with the meat and seasoning. The two meld together, making each component taste even better. It also doesn't leave a strong aftertaste in your mouth due to the vinegar. However, it's also a bit forgettable.

So, overall, while Best Choice does work well with steak, it's not a huge standout either. I might use it again, but it does get blown away by other, better sauces. I would say it's a good sauce to use if you're on a budget.

The next sauce on our list comes from a fairly well-known mid-range steakhouse chain: Texas Roadhouse. They have an entire line of steak sauces, so I went with their original Bold and Rich sauce. It has the usual suspects on the ingredient list: vinegar, tomato paste, raisin paste, salt, tamarind extract, garlic, and onion. While it's created for steak, this sauce can also be used as a dip or marinade for chicken, carne asade, and many other dishes.

The sauce has a bold flavor that hits you with the vinegar at first, but it quickly fades out, allowing other spices to come out. It's a very smooth, blended taste that is pleasing to the tongue — and probably one of the reasons why the restaurant is popular. When paired with the steak, the sauce doesn't overpower it; instead, it works with it. Again, as the vinegar fades out, it allows for the tenderness and saltiness of the beef to come through and mix with the savoriness of the sauce.

It's a sauce that could be fun to play around with, either by trying different seasonings on the meat to see how they work together or trying it out on wings or grilled chicken. I liked this one, but I'm not sure if I would keep it on hand all the time.

Country Bob's All Purpose Sauce was a bit of a surprise for me. It looks like any other brown sauce and even has all the traditional ingredients: vinegar, tomato, sugar, molasses, garlic, onion, tamarind, and other spices. While it's primarily used as a steak sauce, you can also use it as a dipping sauce for just about any kind of meat. It's also a chicken marinade and rice seasoning.

The very first thing to hit your tongue is the sweetness of the molasses and sugar. It gives the sauce a hint of barbecue — not super surprising, considering Country Bob has an extensive line of barbecue sauces. I really liked the sweetness. It wasn't overwhelming but just enough that it blended with the savoriness of the other ingredients.

When combining this with a steak, like flank steak grilled just right, you get the perfect flavor pallete. The molasses, vinegar, and juiciness of the meat all mold together. While the sauce does leave a bit of an aftertaste that hits you in the back of the throat, it is not as intense as other sauces on this list and is far more enjoyable. I'd honestly like to try this on grilled chicken and see how it works out.

I was really looking forward to G Hughes Sugar-Free Yum Yum Sauce. I'm a big fan of hibachi steakhouses and all the various Japanese sauces in which you can dip everything from steak to shrimp. Let me tell you, this sauce surprised me, then surprised me again. It has Sriracha sauce, tomato paste, vinegar, cider vinegar, and mustard, among other ingredients. The Yum Yum sauce is advertised as being slightly sweet tasting and similar to traditional Japanese hibachi.

Maybe it's been a long time since I've last been to a hibachi restaurant, but on its own, this sauce is very sweet — surprisingly super sweet. It was so sweet that I forgot it was sugar-free. This started to give me doubts as I dipped my steak into it. I was worried it was going to be too much and have a major clash going on.

I'm happy to report that this is where I was surprised yet again. Something magical happened when I placed the sauce-covered bite into my mouth. The sauce and the steak worked together, soaking up a lot of that extra sugary taste. Hints of cayenne, onion powder, and garlic. It was a delicious blend of sweet and savory that had me making noises that had my dogs giving me strange looks. This was the first sauce I tasted on this list that I would definitely keep in my fridge and use often.

A ranking of steak sauces wouldn't be complete without including Heinz 57. Next to A.1., it's probably one of the most popular steak sauces on the market, and it's not hard to see why. This sauce has been around for over 100 years and uses a secret blend of spices along with tomato puree and vinegar. It's great for dipping, grilling, or marinating — whatever your heart desires.

This sauce definitely lives up to the hype. It has what I would call a spicy tomato flavor that gives a good kick as soon as it hits your tongue. All the ingredients are well-blended so that while you get individual hints, they work together rather than trying to fight for dominance. When paired with the steak, that's where the magic happens. Heinz 57 builds up the flavor of the meat and the seasonings. You had that nice kick before moving through the pepper in the steak seasoning, then the smoothness of the tomato and all the other spices.

Again, I don't often use steak sauce, but from the first taste of Heinz, I decided this is a sauce that I need to keep on hand and bring out the next time I fire up the grill.

There's a reason A.1. is considered the king of steak sauces. That's because there really is nothing that compares to its signature taste. The originator of the sauce — Brand and Co. — is a British company, so it's got roots in the country that created brown sauce. It contains tomato puree, crushed oranges, dried garlic, dried onion, and a blend of spices. Not only can you use it as a dip, but it's also great as a marinade. It's also pretty good on other proteins or grilled veggies.

Being from Oklahoma, I grew up in a steak household. My grandfather and father were part-time ranchers, so we had fresh, came-from-the-pasture-around-our-house beef, and my dad grilled up steak at least once a week, and A.1. is the only steak sauce he allowed in our house.

As mentioned, it has a very distinct taste. Yes, you get the vinegar as with any traditional steak sauce, but you also get a good kick of garlic. To me, it also had a good peppery flavor, which is exactly what I like on my steak. It's not overwhelming, but it doesn't hide, either. A.1. enhanced and brought out the taste of the steak. This was the only sauce I tried that really brought the seasoning I used on my steak to the forefront and really got in and played with it rather than covering it. A.1. adds to the flavor palette, as well as making it better.

Obviously, I had to have a rhyme and reason for how I decided this ranking that was a bit more than just "this tasted better." Taste was a major part of the reasoning, but specifically, I looked at how each sauce tasted on its own and how it tasted with steak. If you're going to use a steak sauce, you want something that isn't going to overwhelm the steak but rather works with the flavor and enhances it. You don't have to wait to pull it out to save a poorly cooked steak, whether it's cooked rare, medium, or well-done.

Personally, I learned how to grill and pan-sear steak from my father, as well as how to season. The reason I always keep a giant bottle of Montreal steak seasoning in my spice rack is because of him. (He's also the reason I'm going to try out butter oil instead of melted butter next.) I whip up a good steak fairly often, mostly using sirloin or ribeye. When I'm feeling fancy, I'll pick up a filet mignon. For this taste test, I used a sirloin cooked medium rare, almost a smidge more rare because, according to Dad, that's the only way to eat a steak.

I chose sauces that were widely available at grocery stores or through online ordering, making them fairly easy for anyone to get. I also stuck with sauces that were affordable. Price didn't have a large impact overall on the placement.