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7 Mild Dry Rubs to Rock Your Outdoor Cooking

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Have you ever noticed that lots of dry rubs have a lot of kick to them?  And by kick, I mean they are hot; they are spicy; and they are not to the taste of my kids or my mother, for that matter.  So around here, where we use our Masterbuilt Electric Smoker or our new Weber Kettle Charcoal Grill at least twice a week (and more during the summer months), we have spent some time studying the Best Mild Dry Rubs both to buy and to make.

As we head into the holiday season, you might consider putting together a gift basket for your favorite backyard chef.  A few of these rubs would be perfect along with our new favorite tools.  Be sure to check back in two weeks for a list of those.

Please note: This post contains affiliate links, many of which are to Amazon. We are an Amazon Affiliate. If you click through to Amazon or another affiliate and make a purchase, we make the tiniest little commission which does not affect your purchase price.

7 Best Mild Dry Rubs to Rock Your Outdoor Cooking | Mild all purpose rubs to buy or to make that you can use for grilling and/or smoking any meat.

Best Mild Dry Rubs to Buy

A1 Original

The A1 Sweet Mequite has the perfect balance of saltiness and smokiness with out the bite of too much pepper.  This one is great on anything you want to throw in the smoker.

McCormick’s Grill Mates Garlic and Herb

This rub is perfect for anything you want to smoke.  We used it a lot this summer for chicken (boneless and bone-in), pork and grilled beef.  We even added it to our burger mixture.

Everything Bagel Seasoning

I mean you can buy this one.  And we do, occasionally, but mostly, we make it.  See below.

Best Mild Dry Rubs to Make

7 Best Mild Dry Rubs to Rock Your Outdoor Cooking | Mild all purpose rubs to buy or to make that you can use for grilling and/or smoking any meat.

Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub

Best Mild Dry Rubs | Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub is perfect for people who don't like it too spicy. Our kids love this one. It is just the right amount of salt, garlic, onion and chili powder with only a hint of pepper.

Of course, this is our signature dry rub. It is one of our two (three?) favorite rubs.  I usually double the batch which gets us at least three smokes.  This is an all purpose rub that is perfect for pork, venison, poultry, beef and seafood. 

Everything Bagel Seasoning

Best Mild Dry Rubs | Everything Bagel Seasoning Dry Rub is perfect for people who don't like it too spicy. Our kids love this one.

Everything Bagel Seasoning is our second favorite rub.  We love the little bit of nuttiness that the seeds bring.  It is great for anything you can smoke including nuts.  Check out our Everything Bagel Smoked Cashews.

Orange Garlic Dry Rub

Orange Garlic Dry Rub | Best Mild Dry Rubs | Orange Garlic Dry is perfect for people who don't like it too spicy. Our kids love this one. Use this one on fish and poultry.

This Orange Garlic Dry Rub is just right for seafood (we use it on salmon) and chicken.  The orange rind gives it just a touch of sweetness without added sugar.

SPG or Salt, Pepper and Garlic

SPG Rub | Salt, Pepper, & Garlic Rub | All Purpose Rub | We use Morton Coarse Kosher Salt, coarse black pepper and granulated garlic. That’s it. And we put a generous amount on anything we are going to grill from burgers to high quality steak.

This one is super easy.  In some circles it is called Texas Rub, but we make ours with a little less pepper to make a mild version. You can find the recipe here.

Mild Dry Rubs to Suit Every Pallet

7 Best Mild Dry Rubs to Rock Your Outdoor Cooking | Mild all purpose rubs to buy or to make that you can use for grilling and/or smoking any meat.

So if you are looking to purchase or to make a dry rub for people who need you to turn down the heat, this is the source.  We hope you will try some of our homemade rubs, but even if you choose to make a purchase, be sure to let us know what your favorite dry rub is.

Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub

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SPG Dry Rub is our latest obsession for grilling and smoking meat.  SPG stands for Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub and in some circles, it might be called Texas Rub, but it seems that Texas Rub tends to be VERY heavy on the pepper and often has a few other ingredients.

Please note: This post contains affiliate links, many of which are to Amazon. We are an Amazon Affiliate. If you click through to Amazon or another affiliate and make a purchase, we make the tiniest little commission which does not affect your purchase price.

Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub | A basic, mild dry rub for grilling and smoking beef, chicken, venison, pork or really anything. SPG Rub

Our Weber Kettle Grill

At some point this summer, after watching a lot of grilling and smoking YouTube videos, my husband decided he wanted to step up his grilling game.  And he bought a Weber Kettle Grill.  I feel so old school.  We are back to charcoal grilling.  And it is delicious.

At the same time, he learned about SPG dry rub.  We first learned about this from Malcolm Reed of How to Barbecue Right on YouTube. He suggests a ratio of 1:1:1. It was fabulous, but…

Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub | A basic, mild dry rub for grilling and smoking beef, chicken, venison, pork or really anything. SPG Rub

The first thing out of Sunshine’s mouth was, “This is too spicy.”  And truthfully, even for me, it was a little peppery.  So we experimented by cutting the pepper.  And we went with a 2:1:2 ratio.  It was that easy.

We use Morton Coarse Kosher Salt, coarse black pepper and granulated garlic.  That’s it.  Then we put a generous amount on anything we are going to grill from burgers to high quality steak. I even used it on oven roasted chicken.

The Big Batch SPG Dry Rub Recipe

We like to make a good sized batch so that we don’t have to make it every time we need it.  It starts with half a cup of salt, quarter cup of coarse black pepper and half a cup of granulated garlic.  (Granulate garlic supposedly helps keep your mixture from getting clumpy.)

We pour it all into a pint mason jar and shake until it is mixed.

Our favorite lids rubs in mason jars are these shaker tops from Ball which make it really easy to sprinkle the rub onto our meat.  You can also save the shaker lids from Parmesan cheese because believe it or not, they also fit mason jars!

If you want to make a smaller batch for only one meal, you can do 1 Tablespoon of salt, 1 1/2 teaspoons pepper and 1 Tablespoon of granulated garlic.

Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub is a perfect all purpose dry rub that is not too heavy on the pepper. SPG Rub is just the right combination of salt, garlic and black pepper while still qualifying as a mild dry rub.

Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub

So if you are looking for simplicity in your grilling tonight, whip up a batch of SPG Dry Rub today. It is so easy. And so delicious. It the the perfect addition to steak, chicken, TriTip and burgers.

Try adding to to Smoked Tri Tip instead of Semiconservative Granola Girl Rub. It’s pefect. For directions on how to smoke a Tri Tip, go here.

Happy grilling.

SPG Rub | Salt, Pepper, & Garlic Rub | All Purpose Rub | We use Morton Coarse Kosher Salt, coarse black pepper and granulated garlic. That’s it. And we put a generous amount on anything we are going to grill from burgers to high quality steak.

Salt, Pepper & Garlic Rub

SPG Rub is an all purpose rub of Morton Coarse Kosher Salt, coarse black pepper and granulated garlic.  That’s it.  We put a generous amount on anything we are going to grill from burgers to high quality steak.
Print Recipe Pin Recipe
Prep Time 5 minutes
Course Main Course

Equipment

  • measuring cups
  • Jar with lid

Ingredients
  

  • ½ cup Kosher coarse salt
  • ½ cup granulate garlic
  • ¼ cup coarse black pepper

Instructions
 

  • Add all the ingredients to a jar, put the lid on tightly and shake until mixed.
  • Add to any meat you plan to grill or smoke.

Notes

You can make a smaller batch for one meal: 1 T salt, 1 T garlic, 1.5 tsp pepper.
Keyword Electric Smoker, Gluten free

Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub

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We are in love with our Masterbuilt Electric Smoker.  I have written a number of posts about our love affair including 10 Foods to Smoke in Your Electric Smoker and 10 MORE Foods to Smoke in Your Electric Smoker and a variety of recipes (here).  Additionally, we are always on a quest to find a dry rub that is not too spicy (ie. hot) and not too salty.  It seems that most commercially produced dry rubs come with heat.  A main ingredient in many rub recipes on the interwebs is red pepper or cayenne.  And well, my kids just aren’t having it.  Even the littlest bit of of bite has them brushing their tongues with their napkins.  So, I have been working on writing recipes that meet their tender tongue’s needs.  The first was The Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub followed by Everything Bagel Dry Rub and now, Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub.

Orange Garlic Dry Rub | Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub

 


Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub

Sunshine loves salmon.  And, she also loved smoked meats.  So, of course she wanted to put those loves together for some smoked salmon.  Recipes often pair salmon with citrus, so it seemed to make sense to make a dry rub that combines citrus with garlic.  So, I put together Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub which you can use on both for smoking or baking seafood.  You can try it on salmon, flounder or shrimp. It also works with chicken.

Orange Garlic Dry Rub

It is just a mixture of dried orange peel, dried minced garlic, kosher salt and paprika.  Note that because this dry rub is intended to be mild in flavor, there is no pepper.  If you like heat, feel free to play with adding some.

This makes a small batch.  One batch equals enough to do 3-5 fillets of salmon depending on the size.  So, if you want to have it on hand in your pantry, make a quadruple batch.

Make a Batch Tonight

Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub

So, if you are looking to make some seafood in the oven or in your electric smoker, try it with Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub.  We love Baked Orange Garlic Salmon.

PS. This post may contain affiliate links. When you click the link and make a purchase through the link, we make a little money, this helps to keep The Semiconservative Granola Girl going. Thank you for your support.


Print Recipe


Orange Garlic Seafood Dry Rub

Cuisine Electric Smoker
Keyword dry rub

Prep Time 5 minutes

Servings
cup


Ingredients

Cuisine Electric Smoker
Keyword dry rub

Prep Time 5 minutes

Servings
cup


Ingredients


Instructions
  1. Mix all of the ingredients well and rub on seafood or meat before cooking.


Share this Recipe
 

Everything Bagel Dry Rub

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One of the first recipes I wrote here on the Semiconservative Granola Girl was for Everything Bagel Encrusted Venison Steaks.  We actually haven’t made them in a while.  The recipe is not Whole30 or Paleo as it calls for buttermilk and flour.  At some point, I’ll will probably go back and make a Whole30 version of the recipe.  For now, however, I am missing everything bagels.   So, if you can encrust steak with everything mix, then why not smoke a tri tip with everything bagel mix.  And a new dry rub was born here on the Semiconservative Granola Girl:  Everything Bagel Dry Rub.

Everything Bagel Dry Rub

Everything Bagel Dry Rub

Recently, we were on Long Island, where they have REAL bagels and we had a major cheat (PS. Whole30 followers, we were not actually in our 30 days, mostly just trying to stick to a Paleo diet, so not scolds necessary!)  And I had an Everything Egg Bagel.  It was amazing. I was reminded just how much I love a bagel.  And how everything bagel seasoning is just perfect for, well, everything.  So why not turn it into a dry rub.

Everything Bagel Dry Rub

So the thing about an everything bagel is the ingredients are usually in a dry rubs anyway, so just add seeds.  Smoked sesame seeds?  Poppy seeds, too?  Yes, please.  We added a few mustard seeds just to get a little non-spicy zing.


It is the perfect rub to add to a tri tip roast (see Smoked Tri Tip) and venison or beef of any kind. Oh and don’t forget those nuts. I adjusted the recipe just a little bit again to make Everything Bagel Smoked Cashews.  Hmm…. I wonder what else we can add Everything Bagel Dry Rub to?

This is not a spicy dry rub because ,as I have mentioned in the past, our can’t tolerate much spice.  That’s actually why adapting everything bagel topping to a dry rub was perfect for our family.  If you would like it to have a little kick, add more pepper.   Oh, and we love to use these shaker lids on a canning jar to store and use our dry rubs.

So friends, get your smoker or your grill going.  Make up a batch of this Everything Bagel Dry rub.  And cook in the joy.

 

PS. This post may contain affiliate links. When you click the link and make a purchase through the link, we make a little money, this helps to keep The Semiconservative Granola Girl going. Thank you for your support.

Print Recipe
 Everything Bagel Dry Rub
Course Main Dish
Cuisine Electric Smoker
Servings
cup
Ingredients
Course Main Dish
Cuisine Electric Smoker
Servings
cup
Ingredients
Instructions
  1. Add all the ingredients to a jar. Put a lid on the jar and shake until well mixed. OR add the ingredients to a bowl and use a whisk to mix well. Store in a tightly covered jar or container.
Share this Recipe
 

Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub

by 1 Comment

In our house, we are fans of smoked meat.  We have a Masterbuilt Electric Smoker (<–affiliate link) that gets a fair amount of use.  Most weeks, we use it at least once if not more.  Sunshine likes smoked meat.  However, she cannot tolerate spiciness.  More than once, I have had to cut the best part of the meat–the bark–off of her dinner so that she would eat it.  We tried a variety of commercially produced rubs, many of which Jim and I liked.  Unfortunately, they were all of no-go for my delicately palleted children.  Solution:  Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub.

This post may contain affiliate links. When you click the link and make a purchase through the link, we make a little money, this helps to keep The Semiconservative Granola Girl going. Thank you for your support.

Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub

Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub

Most commercial rubs have quite a kick to them.  I guess they assume the audience is adult men standing around a smoker, nursing it and a beer all weekend.  However the beauty of the electric smoker is that you can pretty nearly “set it and forget it.”  (Pretty nearly.  It does need to be checked periodically but not like a traditional smoker.)  So rubs that you buy at the store are heavy on black pepper, red pepper and cayenne pepper, as are most recipes I’ve seen.  These all leave Sunshine and The Boy rubbing their tongues with napkins to try to get the sting out.

My Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub is a delicate balance (ha ha!  that just sounds like a coffee commercial or something!) of Kosher salt, minced onion, minced garlic and paprika along with a little dry mustard, chili powder and black pepper.

Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub layers

It’s really easy to prepare and you can easily double the recipe to have it on hand.  One batch is probably good for smoking three meals depending on what you are preparing.  We used it on two separate occasions for Smoked Tri Tip and still have enough left to use on some venison steaks tonight.

smoked tri tip with rub

I love to use these Ball jar lids that are intended for keeping herbs that you dry at home; however, they work perfectly as a shaker lid for the dry rub rub.

So, if you need a less spicy dry rub, Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub is the way to go.  Let us know if you try it and what you think.  We’d love to hear your feedback.

Mild dry rub | for chicken, pork, beef and venison | Whole30, grain-free, dairy-free, gluten-free, Paleo--this is a garlicky, oniony dry rub that won't burn your tongue
Print Recipe
 Semiconservative Granola Girl Dry Rub
Cuisine Electric Smoker
Prep Time 5 minutes
Servings
cup
Ingredients
Cuisine Electric Smoker
Prep Time 5 minutes
Servings
cup
Ingredients
Instructions
  1. Add all the ingredients to a jar. Put a lid on the jar and shake until well mixed. Or add the ingredients to a bowl and use a whisk to mix well. Store in a tightly covered jar.
Share this Recipe
 

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