Woodstock Scotch Bonnet Hot Sauce Review

Woodstock Scotch Bonnet 

Sauces like these are always the most challenging to write, in that there’s not necessarily a lot to say about them. This one, with Scotch Bonnet and Habanero, as the main heat drivers, is fairly tame. Those peppers are also the main flavors as well, so if you’re looking for a thick-ish sauce that is very pepper forward in terms of flavor, with a sort of pronounced vinegar undercurrent, this would fit the bill nicely. It does have carrots and garlic listed as ingredients, but those are not really present to any great degree in the flavor. The sauce itself is a sort of yellow-light orangish color, so maybe the carrots were there to add something along those lines.

A couple things sort of stand out to me about the sauce. The first is that the odor of it threatens to put me off every time, though I do find the flavor to happily not be a match for the smell. I can’t quite put my finger on what the issue is there, but I don’t find it particularly pleasant. The second is that this has both xanthan gum and corn starch as thickeners and while it is still pourable, it is very reminiscent of a gel quality to me. I don’t particularly love that aspect, either. 

The sauce itself is a bit pedestrian and one-note and with the level of astringency, it’s best paired with something fried or where you might want it to hold in place and cut the richness, say potentially on a sub sandwich. I don’t see Scotch Bonnet showing up in sauces a great deal and when I saw this one didn’t also have onions, I got a bit excited, but this is another in a long line of Scotch Bonnet sauces that wind up a touch disappointing and more on the underwhelming side.

Bottom line: If you’re looking for a very pepper forward sauce, to sort of get a grasp on the Scotch Bonnet by way of Habanero flavor, backed with a good vinegar hit, this might be up your alley.  

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 6
            Flexibility: 3
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 3

Overall: 3

2025 Q2 Update

2025 Q2 Update

04.01.25: Last year for this update, I took a look at statuses of a couple things. One was the remaining Hot Ones season sauces left, which I won’t re-examine until probably the End of the Year Q4 posting, but the other was the sauce companies most represented on this blog (the FOH videos tend to follow this pattern as well, so no need for a separate list). As soon as I finish scheduling out the written reviews for June, I will tie that list to whatever date that is, as I’m a touch tickled by the idea of this “behind the scenes” look, which, admittedly, probably matters to no one beyond me. Also,, I’m not going to post a list on the blog for the holidays covered in the FOH video series. Check the Community section of the channel page for that (links at right). 

I may have mentioned this in the past, but my methodology for the FOH videos is to upload the following month on the first day of whatever month. So, for example, today, I uploaded all of the May FOH videos. From there, I usually will wind up bumping videos here and there if something comes along that I want posted sooner, but with fairly rare exceptions, most of the FOH content is filmed in advance, sometimes months ahead. I mention this because doing a little rough calculation in my head, I project the FOH series on YouTube will wind up hitting and possibly going past 1000 videos before the end of 2025.  Also, in a sort of odd coincidence, all three of the channels I do content for on YouTube had something go live today, which hasn’t happened in a good 3 years or so...

04.11.25: As I may have noted in these pages, at one time, I was making content for 3 different YT channels. For a good part of the time this blog has been running, it has been one main one I do with and largely at the behest of my son, with first the FOH video series being added in 2019 and then the second additional channel strictly for gaming content in 2020 prior to the pandemic hitting. The gaming channel I rather strongly disliked how I was producing content and it became far more of a grind than it was worth. However, with newer tech and newer methods, I have re-launched it, only this time streaming (on both YT and Twitch). I am not going to promote those here and indeed, this entire entry is unrelated to this blog, for the most part...

I say for the most part, because, though I am loathe to discuss politics generally, in either these pages or in most of the videos across the FOH series and the first YT channel I mentioned, since I’m doing more casual quarterly updates for a while here, at least, I figured I’d put it here, as none of my current creative output is really immune to current events. As Aragorn told Theoden in Lord Of The Rings, and I paraphrase here, politics is coming for everyone, whether you recognize (or desire) it or not. The current self-inflected sucking chest wound of a certain person picking idiotic tariff fights has the capacity to end the first YT channel entirely (or if not, at minimum send it on hiatus) and severely diminish or dampen the other two. As the FOH series is fairly directly related to this blog, that would potentially induce a substantial curbing here as well.

I know in the past, mostly during the Year End Updates, that I thought I would be producing less content, the underlying idea was that it would be by my own volition, my own choice, rather than incomprehensibly stupid and grossly erratic decisions at the highest level. I realize that all things have an ending date and nothing lasts forever, but I suspect all of us would prefer that it be on our own terms when it comes rather than at the behest of the maniacal and generally false rantings of a lunatic.  I don’t know what will happen, but if it does turn out that way, it would be a revolting, disgusting, and utterly unnecessary development of the highest order. 

04.20.25: I’ve always kind of wondered and never quite got around to doing this, but given my fondness for statistics, I finally decided to attempt calculating a ponder. One US gallon is 128 fluid ounces. A typical bottle of hot sauce is ostensibly 5 fluid ounces, so 26 (technically 25.6, but I’m rounding in the name of ease of conceptualization) of those used in a single year. Even though I do finish out the vast majority of sauces I review, it’s not as straight across as counting how many I reviewed in a given year and extrapolating. There are flasks (or just larger versions of the 5 fl. oz. regular bottle shape), which tend towards 8 or 10 fl. oz. Sometimes I do sets. At times, there are 3 or 4 fl. oz. bottles. The main bottles are not always filled to exactly 5 fl. oz. (I did a breakdown on measuring this, which you can find in the non-food FOH playlist on YT) Sometimes I will have duplicates that I’ve already reviewed, but wish to enjoy again. Now, here’s the fun of math. Assuming we wondered if we were going through an entire 5 gallon bucket of sauce in a year, that would be 128 of the usual 5 fl. oz. bottles. The highest year of posting on this blog, to this point, was 2022, in which I did 95 posts. We eliminate 4 posts for the quarterly updates, one for the post on the Fiery Show in Albequerque I went to that year, one for my favored nation hot sauce makers, and another for a 10th year anniversary post, we arrive at 88. 88 x 5 is 440, which is a fair amount, to be sure, but not even to 4 gallons. 

Here is the point it gets tricky. Some of those posts were mini-reviews of packets, which didn’t have a size listing...that I noticed anyway. There were some flasks that year. There was a double review that year. Some of the sauces I only finished partially and some not at all. I had some carryover from the previous year. Some from that year carried over into 2023. If I had to guess, the total would probably be closer to 500, still not quite all the way to 4 gallons, but that is all it could be at most, a guess. Scientifically, even a best guest tends to hold the same value as any other guess and rather than starting a given year with beakers and graduated cylinders, my cursory in a purely academic question begins to wane at this point...

Since I’m not super far into this year, as of this writing, I could do this year, but already there have been a number of 8 fl. oz. and 10 fl. oz., some partial bottles I’ve given away, some I might have tossed (can’t remember now) after the fridge expiration episode in January (see Q1 update) and don’t now remember how much carried over from 2024 and it wouldn’t have been quantified anyway...and yes, I realize this is now the third paragraph concerning a point that is probably moot...buuuuut a not so small part of my mind is thinking this year would have been kind of cool to track as it’s shaping up to be another year of fairly high consumption, almost certainly one of the highest ever. I will very likely hit 100 posts this year, if not 100 sauces reviewed outright.  

04.26.25: It dawns on me now that I should have noted that not only am I scheduling the written reviews on this blog, but I’m scheduling those mostly on days when I do not have a FOH series video going live on YouTube. I’m not sure anyone is paying enough attention to notice, but my hope is that on Sundays,Wednesdays, and Fridays, which are generally video days, people who may be inclined towards content from me would head there and then come here the rest of the days for new reviews...or more conveniently just add notifications to their feed, but I don’t have any insight into that.

As of right this very second, I have 916 videos on the channel, of which somewhere in the high 800s are live, with a handful are not related to the FOH series and are mostly de-listed. This leaves 84 videos left to hit 1000. I am posted up through May 2025 currently, which means, with 7 months left, I would need to average 12 videos a month to hit 1000 before the end of the year. My current monthly average, without including the holidays stuff, is 14. Obviously, the holidays stuff will skew the monthly average, but at the current rate, I should rather handily hit 1000 FOH series videos on YouTube this year, which will make this the second channel to hit that number in 2025, a facet which I find slighly stunning (the third channel, which I reactivated this year, is very unlikely to hit that number until next year, assuming I’m able to continue producing content for it). I’m very close to already having either enough videos in the can and/or enough stuff at hand for the content part, so it’s just a matter of using, consuming, reviewing, filming, etc. This will also potentially springboard posts to this blog past 100, but as I consider a year to clear the pipes, so to speak, barring any major influx, which I know, I know, I always say that, but barring any of that, things should calm down more for 2026...maybe. I’ve covered stuff that was really backburnered, so I’m getting to the point where I’m winding down being able to find new non-sauce stuff that I’m interested in covering. Additionally, there is the fact that YouTube itself is becoming increasingly unbearable as a free service. I imagine this is partially to incentivize people to get a subscription so as not to have to endure ads, but I suspect a lot of the viewer base are not so inclined for that and the ad injection is easily the worst it’s even been on the platform.

05.01.25: A thought while I’m uploading the June FOH content...we have had precious little in the way of new spicy stuff drop, either via the snack world or especially in the fast food/restaurant sphere. I kind of felt it was retreating a bit last year, but that definitely seems the case in 2025. I don’t think it’s directly a function of the economy or anything along those lines, but rather the overall cyclical nature of fads and trends. We’ve certainly seen the flow and ebb of chile-related food items in past years...

05.16.25: Update for the Hot Ones list page with Season 27 announced yesterday, which I missed because First We Feast chose a kind of odd format to do it in. This season has 6 sauces for me to get to, 4 of which are entirely new to me, so I’ve updated that part of my coming list, which will be posted at the end of the year. This looks like somewhat less of an onion- heavy season, which is always good, but also it looks like one of the milder seasons I’ve yet seen, with only the very later sauces seeming to have any appreciable heat at all. Naturally, at some point, I’ll be testing that as I get to those sauces as I continue on with the project.

05.23.25: Today, I finished scheduling the last remaining written review I had for June and as mentioned previously, here is the list section for most represented sauce companies, with a few caveats:

Last year the list looked like this, in the following format:

Rank #, Sauce Maker, [# of written full reviews] (FOH YT videos posted currently)

1. CaJohn’s* [21] (19 videos posted)
2. Angry Goat [19] (all videos posted)
3. Hellfire [15] (12 videos posted)
4. Silk City [14] (all videos posted)
5. Pex [8] (7 videos posted)
6 - 9 (tie) Bravado [7] (4 videos posted)
Karma* [7] (all videos posted)
Puckerbutt* [7] (all videos posted)
Torchbearer [7] (5 videos posted)

* = number is not reflective of any sub-lines, such as vanity sauces, co-packed sauces, etc. OR of Mini Reviews

This year’s numbers:

1. CaJohn’s* [21] (19 videos posted)
2. Angry Goat [20] (all videos posted)
3. Hellfire [15] (12 videos posted)
4. Silk City [14] (all videos posted)
5 - 7 (tie) Karma* [8] (all videos posted) 
Pex [8] (all videos posted) 
Puckerbutt* [8] (all videos posted)
8-10 (tie) Bravado [7] (5 videos posted)
Torchbearer [7] (5 videos posted)
Volcanic Peppers [7] (6 videos posted)

Some of you may have noticed I did the numbering wrong last year, wherein the list was meant to go 10, but only 9 actual companies appeared...or possibly not, since no one corrected me on it. I would make the correction now, but I no longer have the data set from that long ago where I originally compiled things. I will note that there are currently 4 or 5 names where I have done 6 sauces for this year, so I’d imagine the list would have been a lot larger had 6 been the next highest total then.

Anyway, for this year, no change to the first 4 positions and it likely won’t be anytime in the near future, so I may not be repeating this next year (I once did a breakdown by alphabetical letter representation, but that was prior to my TOC changes - link at right)...unless I get a wild hair and decide to try to rank them by most represented pepper, which would be interesting, but is pretty unlikely to be something I attempt. I do still have one sauce to go for Puckerbutt (if I counted the Smokin’ Ed’s subline, they’d be higher, but they seem to me (for now, anyway) to exist as different entities), which will put it in to the top 5 at #5 by themselves, but I probably won’t get to that until much later in the year. I have nothing else planned for any of the other makers, with the possible exceptions of HAB, Jersey Barnfire, Silk City and Volcanic. At this point, I have generally exhausted most of the lineups of the other companies. 

The more interesting thing to me, is that if I had included the Hot Ones branded sauces, this list would have looked somewhat different. If I treated the Hot Ones branded line as a separate entity, they would have fallen into the tie at 5 at [8] (all vidoes posted). I did not include them because it is fairly well-known that Hot Ones does not make any of their sauces directly, which is also why I didn’t include any of the vanity stuff from CaJohn’s formerly and why Pepper Palace at [6] (4 videos posted) is similarly not included. This is not to say that all of these makers are producing their own sauces as I have no direct insight into that, but I’m going off of branding and implication that these companies are producing their own product or are at least heavily invested in guidance thereof, as in coming up with recipes, formulations, etc. 

06.01.25: Uploading the month of July on the FOH side today and have to restrain myself from also doing a rough schedule for November...[Ed note: I failed at this pretty considerably.] October is still not quite complete, as I’m hoping to do something to celebrate Halloween...for as much of the the entire month as possible, as usual, but I haven’t opened a new sauce since May 11 and have filmed and scheduled the written reviews for everything I had open in preparation for a little vacation, which will be starting tomorrow. I hope to find a couple things while I’m out and hopefully also film a video on the road, which I meant to do since the Fiery Show of 2022 where I forgot my fucking gear, which I then also forgot last year as well, but it’s all packed and ready to go now. It will be more of a throwback to the old style before I added all the fire and stuff, so editing it when I get back will be kind of interesting. Also will have to deal with questionable light, but am going to bring one of the many temp lights I have and try to use that...we’ll see, I guess. 

It’s kind of nice to not have to worry about content while I’m away, but when I get back, since I’m finishing up a lot of bottles of sauce in the run-up, I’m going to be opening a slew more when I return. Not counting the ones I keep separate for the Wing Things, I have 8 open bottles total, which is a pretty low amount for me, but most of them are sort of specifically directed, as in 3 are Louisiana styles, 2 are Asiany, 1 is Mexican style (and also reviewed previously that is, for lack of better term, one of my “regulars”). Half of them are nearly gone. Most of the time, I keep a lot more non-specific sauces open at once, given that is how my consumption generally goes. Also, when I get back, I will begin the process of re-entering the work force after a very nice palate refreshing bit of time away wherein the gaming streaming thing has kicked off a fresh new wave of creativity. Depending on how that goes, it may slow things down a bit, but basically all of Q3 is scheduled right now, as far as FOH content and I have enough written reviews banked at least through June...not counting the many bottles I anticipate opening upon my return. In fact, I may dial the Hot Ones project way down to accommodate all the other sauces.

06.13.25: Back from vaca and tolerance is pretty low...usually I taper in the summer and particularly during vacation, to give myself a little break and not have to worry about managing bottles and so on during travel, but it’s a bit lower than I usually run it...now that I’m back, though, I imagine it will return to normal shortly. I left with a laundry list of crap to try and locate and was successful on exactly one of those things. A couple were kind of long shots to find out in the wild and plans changed for another, but I did come across some unexpected finds, one of which will be posted by the time you read this and the others will be coming in July. It was kind of interesting filming on the road...that was one of the bigger question marks going into the vacation, but all in all, it seemed to come out acceptably. Lighting is always the main issue with those, unless I want to drag along my gear, which I don’t, but I lucked out a bit on this one. Also, going back to just onboard camera audio I didn’t love, so I may take the mic next time, but all told, I’m glad I took the camera and did it. I will also note that the last previous fast food/restaurant anything video I did prior to this was in early April for the McDonald’s Nether Flame sauce, which didn’t seem specifically oriented towards chileheads. The last entry in that category which was came during March at Firehouse, which is kind of bolstering my point that the chile food fad in that world of the last couple years is fading pretty hard this year. I will note, however, that I have seen a lot of new entries generally utilizing Habanero, so perhaps that is the new (though old) favored nation as far as trends go...which would be kind of wild, if so...    

06.15.24: Been kicking around new playlists for a bit, which is mostly mining the Everything Else Spicy playlist every time it gets too close to 100 videos, and created one for Spicy Pickled Stuff today, with the link for that, as always, at the right. I did have someone ask for my cooking videos, which I’ve also been considering a while, but that is not going to be a fast prospect, so that may be a bit down the road yet. 

06.24.25: Did some quick math in my head and I already have enough videos filmed and ready to run past 1000 FOH videos now...also, November is nearly entirely scheduled, also now...finally, in an odd bit to sort of wrap up this very random musing, one of my camera SD cards completely disintegrated, as in fell apart from the physical wear of being removed and shoved back into the camera and then into the SD reader on the computer (it was used to record probably over 2000 videos). I took it out prior tto filming, as the camera was throwing an error and it fell apart in my hands. Never seen that happen before, and I was scrambling after trying to find another that would work in the camera, but that it was one of those things too wacky to actually be mad about...until I discovered that all of the backups I had were of insufficient write speed to keep up with the camera recording...fun!

Captain Mowatt's Canceaux Turbeaux Hot Sauce Review

Captain Mowatt’s Canceaux Turbeaux

The original version of this sauce, the Canceaux, was evidently named in reference to a place in Nova Scotia and was the sauce that put Captain Mowatt’s on the map. This version, with the Turbeaux (turbo) designator was the hotter variant of that sauce. I don’t know what the exact difference in peppers is - this one has Cayenne, Red Jalapeno, Bird’s Eye, and Japone - but definitely opting for the hotter one was the good move here, even though the heat level is decidedly mild. Given those peppers I just mentioned, none of which I would consider hot, that’s probably to be expected. One of those whole peppers was also floating in the sauce, but I’m not sure which, exactly. 

To be sure, they are in delicious combination, though. I believe this combination was also used the phenomenal Sharks’ Bite Mustard from this same company (video in the Spicy Mustards YouTube playlist at right), and it is a solid winner. This is definitely one of the most flavorful and utterly excellent sauces I’ve had this year. This pairing of peppers and the cane sugar is an outstanding base and the garlic here is used judiciously. It is definitely there, but not aggressively so the balancing act this sauce performs is exquisite. 

This was portrayed as a seafood sauce, but the website suggests it is more a “Swiss army knife of sauces.” To an extent, this is true and re-affirms what I’ve said time and time again, being that if you make a great tasting enough sauce, it is good on anything, making it by default an “everyday” or “table” sauce.. However, while I obviously like this sauce a great deal, I would not go quite to that extent. This is, in essence, more of an Asian-style sweet chile or sweet Thai chile type sauce, though probably one of the best versions of those I’ve had. Still, while I don’t doubt mixing this with cream cheese would make a delightful treat, I can’t say that I think it works with everything. Definitely fried foods, definitely seafoods, definitely anything where that sauce would be used and a good portion of what is described on the website, but I can’t see this working well, if at all, on tacos, for instance, or on pizza either, for that matter. I do think it is more flexible than that style of sauce tends to be those and this shouldn’t take away from what is a brilliantly designed sauce.

Bottom line: Extremely flavorful Asian sweet chile sauce, with a tempering of the garlic in favor of a wholly delightful mix of peppers and the cane sugar, just an utterly fantastic version of that style. 

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 10
            Flexibility: 6
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 9

Overall: 7

 

Mythical Meats Griffin’s Claw Hot Sauce Review

Mythical Meats Griffin’s Claw 

Note: It was pointed out to me, for which I'm grateful, in the Mythical Meats Unicorn Magic review, that the MM website points this as relabels of Torchbearer sauces. I kind of figured that was maybe the case, that they were not producing it, not that Torchbearer specifically was, but seeing that makes a lot more sense. This particular one is the Torchbearer Honey Badger, which I reviewed here: https://d-dubtsaaf.blogspot.com/2022/12/torchbearer-honey-badger-honey-mustard.html nearly 3 years ago. This also raises the question of whether I should just leave that link and call it a review, but I think, for now, I will just leave both up as perhaps expanding on the original review.

What we have here is another mustard that is called a hot sauce. It has a lot of mustard components, along with various sweeteners and then Scorpion, Reaper, and Cayenne powders, along with a heavy dose of both black pepper and garlic. So, while I will be rating it as a hot sauce, it functions nearly exclusively as a mustard. 

Aha, I hear you perhaps think to yourself, but what kind of mustard? Well...it definitely has the color of a sweet mustard and no fewer than 3 separate sweeteners, but because there is such a preponderance of bitter ingredients, it winds up in this weird halfway limbo, where it’s not quite a regular yellow mustard, but also nowhere near sweet enough to be an actual sweet mustard. This inadvertently causes it to have a foot in both worlds, but servicing neither particularly. Perhaps considering it a rather punchy vaguely sweet yellow mustard with heavy doses of garlic bits and black pepper is the way to think of it.

I do enjoy the flavor somewhat. It does tend towards the bitter a lot, which can get distracting, and I really don’t particularly like the grainy mouth feel much. I think they should have definitely either gone all the way towards one or the other, either a regular mustard or if they wanted to make it a sweet one, hit the sugars a lot harder...and also not used granulated garlic, when they were seemingly already using garlic powder. Garlic doesn’t really show up as a flavor, though, as it is pulled down by the other stronger flavor notes.

So, usage-wise, it does mostly acceptably as a yellow mustard. Heat-wise, with the Reaper and Scorpion powders in there, there can be a good bit of punch and it does seem to build slightly. My guess is that it will push non-chileheads slightly, if they have a bunch of it and I will say that I think it was a neat trick getting this much heat while retaining as much flavor as they do.

Bottom line: I’d put this as perhaps a somewhat hotter mustard, maybe towards the upper middle of the pack, but as a hot sauce, definitely it fails on multiple fronts...mostly because it is not one.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 2
            Flavor: 3
            Flexibility: 2
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 4

Overall: 3

 

Beach Shack Pineapple Mango Habanero Hot Sauce Review

Beach Shack Pineapple Mango Habanero

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating that when newer sauce companies, of which I believe this is one, are entering a segment of the market that is well-established, in this case, the fruit-based sweet hots, there are a couple avenues of approach for differentiation. They can either do what the segment is already doing, but just do it way better or they can choose to make a variant that is unlike everything else, yet still within the bounds of the category. Beach Shack appears to choose neither here.

I imagine that rather than making a pineapple-Habanero or a mango-Habanero, they decided to just use both, but the result is that the flavor is like neither, but instead more of a general “tropical” vibe. This is then accented by a couple of unusual additions, that of lime and cilantro, with the first being unwelcome and the second being lost. The sauce itself will, at times, have flashes of Habanero, but that appears to be there mostly for heat, though it is pretty low. 

The flavor isn’t bad or anything, just more unusual with the unexpected flavor notes. It reminds me a bit of the celery in the mix with one of the previously reviewed entries, the Poirier’s Original Lousiana-Style, in that I keep forgetting its part of things and find it jarring when I’m reminded on the palate when consuming it. Citrus is one of those ingredients, where I think one has to be judicious, as it’s a fairly strong flavor that won’t always go with everything where this style of sauce might, like pizza, for example, and here, it works to disadvantage, in cutting down the flexibility. It also moves this into being a sauce not especially representative or reflective of the category it’s in. For those unfamiliar with the style, they’re probably better off with a different sauce first.

Bottom line: If you’re a person who likes lime in everything and/or is curious what a tropical Habanero sauce would be like with lime in it, this might be right up your alley. For me, it’s much less so.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 4
            Flexibility: 3
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 4

Overall: 3

Volcanic Peppers Red Reaper Mango Hot Sauce Review

Volcanic Peppers Red Reaper Mango

For a while into the bottle, I thought this sauce may have been misnamed. Despite mango being in the name, it was overshadowed by the forceful burning nature of the much more prominent mighty mighty Reapers in it. This definitely has a strong element of the superhot bitter, which is perhaps not helped by the addition of Thai peppers, which I like a lot, but which can be a bit on the bitter side by themselves, and Chia seed. It also has cardamom, which I didn’t notice until just prior to writing this review, and which I find kind of an odd coincidence, given the preceding review.

I think more than anything, this is mostly a sort of non-distinct fruity slightly sweet Reaper sauce. It is a very nice medium thickness and is pretty smooth. It definitely is a very superhot forward sauce, as noted, and given both the Reapers and Ghosties (along with Habanero, to round out the quad of peppers), this is very much a chilehead only sauce. Indeed, it takes a certain degree of tolerance to be able to pick out some of the more subtle flavor notes, particularly on the back end, which does also include very slight passes at mango, without being able to tolerance the immediate blast of the Reapers. Given that Reapers and Habanero are both building peppers as well, this can get to a pretty nice little blaze, though I found heat to be mostly concentrated on my tongue.

It is not a “normal” fruit-based sweet hot, which is both good and bad. Given that it’s sticky, it does hold to food pretty well and the slightly ambiguous flavor nature lends itself well to burgers, as well as chicken. It does need a fairly strong flavor accompaniment for best results, however, as it does tend towards bitterness fairly readily. That sort of non-distinctness in flavor profile also lends it well to things like pizza also, though I did find, given a bit of flavor cancellation, that the sweetness in conjunction with mac and cheese was not desirable. It is pretty fun to play around with, though, and one of the nice things about running this hot, as well as the aforementioned consistency and stickiness, is that a little will go a long way.

Bottom line: Volcanic always tends to have a pretty interesting approach to sauces and this is no exception, though, again, it does take a certain tolerance to Reapers, both in heat and superhot bitterness, for this sauce to be fully enjoyable.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 3
            Flavor: 6
            Flexibility: 6
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6

Overall: 5

 

Ginger Goat We Got The Beets Hot Sauce Review

Ginger Goat We Got The Beets

I will start this off by saying that this sauce is not for me. I am no fan of Indian flavors particularly, and had I noticed Garam Masala was in there, probably would have skipped it. Further, there are 3 very aromatic spices where I find a little goes a very long way. Those are: cloves, cinnamon, cardamom. Nutmeg is similar, but to a lesser extent, and also present. So, I am not predisposed to enjoy this much and one should keep that in mind with my commentary here.

I do like beets, quite a lot, in fact. I also like pomegranates. Neither of those shows up in sauces a lot. I also really like Ginger Goat’s very adventurous and inventive approaches to sauces, enough that I scanned the ingredient list looking for the presence of onions (none, of course, or you wouldn’t be reading this), but upon not finding them, what was there did not really sink in. Once I got it in hand, I was immediately confused. I expected something different and what was in the bottle was a lot looser than anticipated.

But we keep an open mind, always, and so, after I felt it had sat on the shelf an appropriate time (and I totally didn’t forget I had it or anything), I busted it open and gave it a fair shot...then another, then several more, with steadily diminishing results. This is a sauce that has an odd consistency...the pulps, I assume from the beets and Reapers, tend to collect a bit in the center and the liquid pools off. No amount of agitation seemed to help this. The flavor is very spicy, in a non-piquant way, though I will say, with the mighty Reapers as the heat driver, this was an easy two and had I been able to eat enough of it to enjoy further, it probably would have been pushing a 3. I doubt very much that non-chileheads will find this heat level enjoyable. There are some slight beet and very light pomegranate flavor notes, but this sauce has maybe 20 different ingredients, but it is the fragrant spices that strike me most and I find off-putting.

The thing that I liked best about this sauce had nothing to do with the sauce. You see, prior to filming the video for this, I was not aware Garam Masala was in it, so I thought perhaps, given that I was struggling to pair this sauce and wasn’t super familiar with cardamom, figured that was the issue. So, I did some internet sleuthing to see where cardamom might be used. Coffee came up, which was a non-starter, as I am not fond of that flavor and also, I’m not pouring hot sauce into coffee. Ok, so what else? Well, lamb. I almost never have lamb and don’t really enjoy it, so am not about to start. Next...well, next was this Finnish sort of breakfast roll called nisu (or nissua or pulla). I discovered there are no restaurants or import shops that had this, so I was not able to have that directly, but I did enjoy the sort of deep dive that trying to find where cardamom was used in a food sense provided.

Bottom line: Despite the overall rating, again, this is not by any means a bad sauce, but also very much not a sauce for me. If you like the spice flavors I mentioned above more than I do, and are also a chilehead, this may worth a go, but I suspect that is a fairly shallow pool. 

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 3
            Flavor: 0
            Flexibility: 0
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 0

Overall: 1

 

Poirier's Louisiana Style (All Flavors) Hot Sauce(s) Review

Poirier’s Original Louisiana Style
Poirier’s Louisiana Style Creole Maple
Poirier’s Louisiana Style K.O. Edition

This trio hits a lot of soft spots with me, which should be apparent as this review goes on. In this case, it is a vanity sauce line, though from a person with whom I’m not familiar, but who is apparently a UFC dude. Also, one or more of these sauces, possibly the entire line, is the UFC official hot sauce or sauces, and at least one or more of the sauces is a direct crossover with Heartbeat, who has not appeared in these pages heretofore as they tend to like to use onions. All of the sauces are made by Heartbeat and may or may not be exclusive to Heatonist and all of them are labeled as Louisiana Style.

The lack of clarity comes because there is a lot of discontinuity in the labels. From what I can tell, the order goes something like this: Original >> K. O. Edition >> Creole Maple, in terms of the ingredients and how the sauces are constructed, with an original base, then a variation on that, then a variation on the variation. The Original has the UFC tag, but the UFC bottle neck hanger thing came on the K. O. Edition, which kind of makes more sense. Two of these are listing as 10 calories per serving and one is listed as zero, which makes no sense, as the ingredients are not that far removed from one another to constitute any kind of difference. 

That oddness aside, the Original is more of what I would refer to as a Cajun than a Lousiana-Style, meaning it is Cayenne, but then also garlic and Habanero and celery, of all things. Those last two modify the flavor profile considerably and while I don’t dislike the celery, I do find it somewhat jarring, mostly because I keep forgetting it’s there and don’t expect it in this kind of sauce. The K.O. takes the original and adds in Ghost Pepper powder. It specifies it as coming from Smokin’ Ed Currie, which, fine, but this addition radically changes the flavor profile and heat. The consistency is thicker than the Original, which is much looser, and also seems to add a lot darker hues and tones to the color. 

The K.O. does a couple things very well. First, it demonstrates amply what I call “superhot bitter,” and this is, by far, the predominant flavor. Secondly, it also demonstrates the trade of flavor in favor of heat. While the Original, even with the Habanero, I’d put as pretty tame, the K. O. Edition, is going to push a lot of non-chileheads and in combination with the flavor, may be too much of an overall package. I gave it a 3 for heat, but it’s more like a 2.5+ and not a 3 outright. It does persist long enough that I gave it the push.

Then we have my favorite of the bunch, the Maple Creole. It has all the ingredients of the K.O., but adds in maple syrup and Chipotle (in adobo) and it makes all the difference in the world. There’s also sage, rosemary, and thyme, but even with the callback to a 70s psychedelic hit jam, those are no competition for any of the other notes. This one reminds me of a somewhat vinegar forward BBQ sauce or a combination of a Louisiana-style and a BBQ sauce, along with some of those sweet, sweet maple notes that show up, but are never overpowering. This sauce exemplifies a stunning display of flavor balance, so long as it’s agitated - all of them need this - and is one of those that stands out and strikes me as special...as well as utterly delicious. 

Bottom line: While I enjoyed playing around with these and thought they were all solid and had something to offer, there’s only one I’d consider getting again, and that is the delightful Creole.

Breakdown Original:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 6
            Flexibility: 5
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 7

Overall: 5

Breakdown K.O. Edition:

            Heat level: 3
            Flavor: 4
            Flexibility: 3
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 3

Overall: 3

Breakdown Creole Maple:

            Heat level: 2
            Flavor: 8
            Flexibility: 8
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 9

Overall: 7

Captain Mowatt's Fuzz Hot Sauce Review

Captain Mowatt’s Fuzz

I think the best way to describe this sauce is to think of it in terms of savory peach. Generally, we don’t associate fruit-based sweet hots necessarily with the savory or umami, while still retaining a very peach forward flavor, but this sauce has pulled off that trick exceedingly well. Add in a bit of astringency from the vinegar and the citrus and this is kind of a fascinating concoction and, to this point anyway, probably the sauce from Captain Mowatt’s I’ve liked best.

It’s kind of hard to find a really good to great peach sauce, partially because I think we all relate individually to that fruit in different ways. I am, as my good buddy Roger from Burn Your Tongue coined it, perfectly partial to peaches myself and any sauce with them in it has my instant attention, but not all of them are created equally, to be sure. If I were to peg this one as one of those aforementioned ratings, it would probably be the former moreso than the latter, but that is because I always want (and hope) the sauces will be more sweet. Partly this is because of preference, but also partly because those sauces tend to keep the sometimes delicate nature of peach flavor more intact. That this one does, yet is decidedly not a particularly sweet sauce is something of a marvel. It definitely is no dessert sauce.

Heat-wise, we have Red Jalapeno, Cayenne, and Bird’s Eye, so nothing too scorching. It adds a nice little tingle of that old fiery hit, just enough to let you know it’s there, but this is not a challenging sauce and it definitely is there more as accompaniment. For me, I find I don’t like pitted fruits generally a whole lot on pork or pizza, but find them, including this, to be exceedingly nice on the lighter colored bird meats, so both chicken and turkey. Fruit-based sweet hots by nature are a bit on the less flexible side, instead leaning in to do what it does with as much excellence as possible.

Bottom line: I find this overall to be a fairly unique and interesting approach to peach hot sauces, but an exceedingly delicious one with good peach flavor well in hand...or in tongue.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 8
            Flexibility: 4
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10

Overall: 6

Butterfly Bakery Heatonist No. 3 Hot Sauce Review

Butterfly Bakery Heatonist No. 3 Pink Peppercorn Gin

No matter how many sauces I try and review and sample and so on, I’m always up for being blown away. This one, with its synthesis of high culinary prowess, merges my love for being a food adventurer and foodie (no surprise it’s a spinoff from a bakery, which might wind up on my bucket list for visiting someday) with just a brilliant flash of skill with hot sauce in the flavors of this sauce.

So long as there is a Hot Ones show and sauces exclusive to Heatonist and so long as I keep going with my Hot Ones project, link at right, there will be a need to maintain a wish list there, which also helps me keep track of sauces I still need to cover. There is also this Heatonist numbered series, whereon various sauce makers create something in commemoration of Heatonist and maybe their tasting room, which I envision sort of like a wine-tasting thing. No idea if that is true or not, but if it is, smart idea. Anyway, since those are also exclusive to Heatonist, and since some sauce makers I’ve been impressed with have some entries there, those are also on my wish list.

So, last year, they had a site-wide sale, along with getting free freight at a certain point, and those are always good opportunities to stock up when you’re covering a wide and varied selection of sauces, such as yours truly does, but once I got it in hand, I couldn’t quite wrap my mind around the applications and was not familar with Butterfly Bakery at the time, so I sat it on the shelf for later...and then proceeded to forget for a few months. Once I did have my first BB experience earlier this year, I dug it back out and moved it forward in the on-deck circle.

Not really knowing what to expect, I was initially taken aback by the sort of bright, lively and effervescent nature of this, with the gin coming to the fore, followed by a rich and lovely Serrano and Habanero base. From there, it seemed like there were a lot of umami notes, presumably from the pink peppercorn, with garlic notable, but not very forward or overpowering. There is also horseradish, but I didn’t really get a lot of that in the flavor. This is really a pretty spectacular explosion of flavors, with a lot of delicate balances and hints in there that emerge, depending on where you use it. For me, it was definitely with lighter meats and I liked this enough that I wanted to put it in a setting where it could have its head and be the sort of “star,” so I’d say less rich foods generally will work best here. It would probably also be very nice in drinks, with the cucumber and lime adding a bit of a refreshing aspect. Given the peppers, this is not especially challenging, but it is clearly not intending to be face-melting, but more a “foodie’s” sauce. The more I use it, the more I appreciate it and this is truly a special sauce.

Bottom line: Yet another mind-blowing concoction from the increasingly impressive Butterfly Bakery...the more heavily you’re into the “foodie” side of things, the more you’ll appreciate it.

 Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 10
            Flexibility: 6
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10

Overall: 7