The Smuggler's Journal

⚓ SMUGGLER'S LOG — ENTRY No. 460
Dated this 22nd day of September, 2026.
Position: dockside, brisket resting under a tea towel, kettle just gone quiet.
Conditions: cool spring evening, smoke still hanging low over the yard.

Today I nearly served a brisket with nothing but tomato sauce standing between it and disaster. Then I remembered the black bottle stashed under the tarp, and the whole board was saved.

Here's a line that sounds like a stunt until you've tasted it: coffee belongs in a barbecue sauce. Not as a gimmick, as structure. Melbourne's Fancy Hank's put this bottle next to the beef in their own restaurant for exactly that reason, and once you understand why, you stop reaching for anything else when there's smoked beef on the board.

What's actually in the bottle

Molasses does the heavy lifting — 29% of the bottle, treacle-black and faintly bitter. Coffee powder deepens it rather than announcing itself, adding roast and a dry edge that stops the sugar running away with the whole thing. Cumin, mustard flour and garlic build a savoury middle, and chipotle powder trails smoke across the finish without adding real heat. It's the least sweet sauce in the Fancy Hank's range, and that restraint is exactly what makes it work on beef.

Ingredients: molasses (29%), tomato paste, water, white vinegar, sugar, salt, spices, onion, capsicum, Worcestershire sauce, apple, treacle, garlic, mustard flour, coffee powder, cumin, cider vinegar, chilli chipotle powder, xanthan gum (415). Made in Australia. Vegan, preservative free, no gluten — it does contain mustard flour, so always check the physical label if that's a concern in your house. It also picked up a Silver Medal at the 2018 Australian Food Awards, which is the kind of thing Darryl would normally boast about, except the brand's already done it better than he could.

Where it earns its keep

This is a beef sauce, first and always. Brisket, short ribs, steak, and — the Fancy Hank's crew's own move — a drizzle over fried eggs the morning after a cook.

Recipe: Reverse-Seared Steak with a Coffee & Molasses Pan Jus

Serves: 2  |  Prep: 10 min  |  Cook: 40 min  |  Total: 50 min

Gear: a smoker or oven capable of holding low heat, a cast iron pan, a probe thermometer.

Ingredients:

• 2 thick-cut scotch fillet or sirloin steaks (at least 3cm thick)
• 2 tbsp Four Monkeys BBQ Home Base Rub
• A knob of butter
• 3 tbsp Fancy Hank's Coffee & Molasses BBQ Sauce
• Splash of beef stock

Method:

1. Season the steaks generously with the Home Base Rub and rest at room temperature for 30 minutes.
2. Cook indirect at 110°C until the internal temperature reads 52°C for medium-rare. Rest for 10 minutes.
3. Get a cast iron pan ripping hot. Sear the steaks hard, 60–90 seconds a side, basting with butter as they go.
4. Rest the steaks again, briefly. Deglaze the same pan with a splash of beef stock, scraping up every bit of fond, then stir through the coffee & molasses sauce off the heat — it thickens fast, so don't let it catch.
5. Slice the steaks against the grain and spoon the pan jus down the side of the board. Dip, don't drown.

Darryl's tip: take the sauce off direct heat before you stir it through the pan juices. It's a finishing sauce, not a simmering one — cook it too long and the coffee turns bitter instead of deep.

The Smuggler's Secret

Warm a spoonful of the sauce gently in a small pan for thirty seconds before you use it as a dip — not to cook it, just to wake it up. The coffee and chipotle bloom properly with a little heat, the same way a ground spice does in fat, and the sauce goes from good to genuinely complex for the cost of half a minute.

Grab the gear

If beef sauce isn't your speed tonight, Fancy Hank's Tomato Sauce is the same Melbourne stable's grandma-recipe classic — 69% real tomato, beetroot and tamarind, built for a sausage roll rather than a brisket. Both live in the Fancy Hank's collection.

Reader level: Everyone — this one rewards a good steak whether you're new to the smoker or you've done this cook a hundred times.

The Smuggler has left the dock. Word from the docks: eat well. The whole haul's at the Rub Hub →
— The Rub Smuggler ⚓