I deliberately held off on creating this post, both because I was thinking more of a year end thing and also because I thought there might be another sauce review I could squeeze in there. As I'm suffering from a mild (what I'm guessing is) flu this weekend, additional sauces are out. I still have a few bottles left to polish off or toss. I hate wasting food; I hate wasting anything. Wastefulness is anathema to me, so a sauce has to be really bad for me to do that.
The few I have left drifting down to the last remnants of the bottles, the Orange Krush, the Chipotle Slam, the Texas Pete -- none of those are quite bad enough I'm willing to toss them. In the case of the Chipotle Slam, since my wife has undertaken a new diet and I don't know when or if I will be having fish tacos again. The sauce works marvelously with seafood and less well with everything else and really doesn't have much of a heat charge, rendering it very low on the usefulness scale. The Texas Pete she likes, so I'm not worried about that getting used up, though I'm very tired of it now and the Orange Krush...I keep finding things I would rather have...I imagine that and the Chipotle Slam will get pitched on New Year's Eve, if either is not eaten by then. Perhaps I will make up a bold new tradition for my annual celebration of turning calendar pages.
I like to make lists and one of my favorite lists is a list of goals. Hot sauce is no different. When I started this blog in September, after deciding to get back in the hot sauce game, I wanted to find a standby Mexican sauce. That was my more immediate need. That has been done with the El Yucateco Green. While it doesn't fit every situation, it is the best thing going so far and the value per price point is unmatched as far as I'm concerned. Perhaps now is a good time to look over the list of sauces:
Everyday sauce: Trappey's Red Devil (this is also a mainstay, despite it having little to no heat)
Grilling sauce: CaJohn's Bourbon-Infused Chipotle Habanero (BICH)
Mexican-style sauce: El Yucateco Green
Asian-style sauce: Huy Fong Chili-Garlic Sauce
Louisiana-style sauce: Trappey's Red Devil
Sweet-hot sauce: CaJohn's Happy Beaver
Looking at this, we can see that heat is not a primary consideration. The Red Devil has precious little, the Chili Garlic a bit more and the El Yucateco has some but is mostly a low level. The only two that pack a punch are the CaJohn's offerings and never of them are really in the upper reaches, at that. They both will get hot, to be sure, but quite a bit of them must needs be used. The main thing here is taste, which is why I've decided to abandon purchasing any sauces that contain extract in them. Towards the end of the Stronger Than Death, it took on much greater overtones of extract. I did some accidental oversaucing on a burger and it has broken me completely as it made me borderline ill and the nauseating metallic taste is something I will not again suffer through. There is little reason; the commonality is that all of the sauces TASTE great and add to the flavor of the food, heightening the enjoyment of the experience. If a sauce diminishes that experience, it is time for it to go.
Back to the sauces, I would like to have another everyday sauce that packs more spice than the Red Devil. Even now, I will still choose it over other sauces, just because it is such a good-tasting sauce. I am also still searching, albeit much more slowly, for a Mexican-style sauce. I would like something like the BICH, which is so good that I will end the search or the Red Devil, again, on the Louisiana-style front. I'm pretty happy with the Happy Beaver on the sweet-hot tip, so no real looking there, either. I also would like to add another Asian-style sauce. Chili-Garlic will always be good and traditional and tasty, but like the Everyday Sauce problem, I'd like to rock a little heat.
Some of my other goals this year were to try to assess some of the various chilis. I don't typically enjoy eating raw pods, so that is a pretty rare event for me and I haven't sought out Morugas or 7-Pots or Red Savinas. I have made my way into using sauces that have all of them (except the 7-Pot) as a featured pepper. My outline was to work my way up. I believe I've pretty much surpassed the level of any of the habanero sauces and am now sort of hovering at the ghost chili. It's a pretty different world up there, in that rarefied air and I don't see myself getting past the ghost chili anytime soon. It still amuses me that the rotten abortion of a "ghost" sauce at Red Robin is what got me back...I guess I sort of owe them for reminding me of one of the more pleasurable experiences of life and restarting me back on this tasty journey. Still...that sauce is weak as shit and they do the Bhuts a terrible disservice using that description. I've gone past 50K, nothing world shattering and for 2013, will try to swing 100K, if I can find a sauce that will do it, that does not contain extract and also does not involve onions, given my intolerance to those...a very difficult proposition, I imagine, but we'll see what happens.
As to this year and (finally) the main subject of this list, I really only had three main contenders. Trappey's Red Devil I would disqualify because it does not pack any heat. So, we had these: El Yucateco Green, CaJohn's BICH and CaJohn's Happy Beaver. A brief discussion and then my pick...
El Yucateco Green came on strong and nearly saved habanero sauces for me. I had a few that weren't bad, but were not really worth getting again, unless I was in a pinch. This sauce changed all that and filled a void. It is also a very good tasting sauce, to boot and easily the best value of any sauce appearing in this blog this year. It is a little light on heat, however.
CaJohn's BICH was one that received a lot of deserved press for fantastic flavor and decent heat. I liked it so much, I've not only ordered more, but have given it away as gifts 3X. I found the runniness of the sauce made it somewhat difficult to use, but it really shone magnificently on the grill. Another friend of mine used it with an injector and was well-pleased, but the lesson here is that it needs both heat and some amount of cooking to really bring the flavor to the fore, which cuts down on flexibility. I have not personally tried the injection yet, but this is my current grilling sauce.
CaJohn's Happy Beaver is the most recent entry here. It possesses a similar, yet distinctive taste to the BICH, but without the runniness. It also works as well hot or cold and is far more flexible. I liked this one so much I immediately bought three more bottles. I keep one at work and one at home and this is one I like to have on-hand in the fridge. It is my current sweet-hot sauce. I've also given this away as a gift, though not nearly as much as the BICH.
Any of these would be deserving of the title and even as I write this, I still have trouble choosing. I've decided to leave it up to the overall rating from the reviews:
My pick this year, based on the numerical value is: CaJohn's Happy Beaver sauce, coming in at a 9 and nudging past both of the other two sauces, which were an 8, respectively. I don't rate manufacturers like that, but if I did, CaJohn's would be a runaway this year. Congratulations, for what it's worth and great job making some damn fine sauces!
Saturday, December 22, 2012
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Happy Beaver Hot Sauce Review
CaJohns Happy Beaver Hot Sauce - [TSAAF Sauce Of The Year 2012]
UPDATE: Video support now available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRCwpMQBFxc
One of the things I was very gratified to see this year was a holiday pricing community throwdown by the sauce manufacturers towards the sauce eaters: you and me and everyone else we can rope into our unique brand of madness. Because I can't trust any of my immediate local vendors (more on that in the archives), when CaJohn got in on this, I was all about it come Cyber Monday.
I got a good haul overall, adding further to my tally of the Bourbon-Infused sauce, which is my go-to grilling sauce. I also some some new ones I wanted to try, including last week's Sancto Scorpio and this week's Happy Beaver. Much like the Bourbon-Infused sauce, this was an instant love.
The bottle I got from the sale, in fact, struck me so hard that I instantly got online to try out Peppers.com. I'd been meaning to try an online sauce vendor and asked the ever-fantastic Scott Roberts for advice. That was one of the sites he commended and so I clicked the dials for 3 more bottles because this is something I must have on hand.
I'm a huge fan of sweet-hot, always have been. One of the things I disliked somewhat about the Bourbon-Infused was how runny it was. Imagine my delight when I had this nice thick, almost ketchupy substance. Gone was the bourbon overtones, but in its place was this fantastic consistency. The first bottle I got from Peppers, though, is much more liquidy...maybe not quite as watery as the Bourbon-Infused, but much less ketchupy. Taste is still there, though, so I chalk the inconsistency up to the eccentricities of buying from small batch hot sauce manufacturers.
The taste here is the Bhut Jolokia instead of Red Savina Habaneros and minus the bourbon. The vinegar is also much less prominent. We still have a similarity of sauces, to a degree, but in the case of Happy Beaver, we have slightly more heat, slightly less complexity and the somewhat flowery tones of the Bhut, which are blended spectacularly with the smoky chipotles. As thick as it is and as tasty as it is, this could easily (and has been) used as a dipping sauce, a task I must say the Bourbon-Infused is inadequate for. Heat is in the same range, somewhat less than the Sancto Scorpio. I'd figure high 30Ks, maybe low 40s. Like the Sancto Scorpio, it stays at a relatively and pleasant heat level, but unlike that sauce, it goes there nearly immediately.
Like the Bourbon-Infused, this will not go with everything. I had it on pizza, one of the foods I consider an easy test for nearly any sauce and found myself wishing I had pepper flakes instead. Yet, put this thing on burgers or an Arby's Triple Cheese Bacon sandwich (especially the Angus) or with chicken or seafood and watch this thing shine. I imagine it would work well on the grill also and given that I have enough bottles (hopefully) to last, I will probably give that a whack next year also.
I hate to mention this, since labels mean very little to me, but some of the copy on this one bothered me. To wit, I quote: "...it has been tamed for the less adventurous." It follows that by saying it is not for the novice but something an experienced chilehead would enjoy. No thanks for the backslap with the "less adventurous" crack and dial up some confusion for the contradiction. Look, I don't need to have my guts burning for hours and hours after I eat something. If I ever do (never will) desire that, I can just take a few drops of extract. I want a great-tasting sauce with some solid heat. Why the manufacturer wants to put in such frankly asinine text as "less adventuresome" (such a combination of adjectives will not help to sell sauce, I wouldn't say) and insult the buyer and consumer of this product is beyond me. I wouldn't normally mention this, but frankly that kind of shit irritates me. If I saw that on the bottle in a store and didn't know what it was, guarantee I would take the same umbrage I do now and buy something else...it's so goddamn unnecessary. As much as it irritates me, it will not, however, stop me from stocking this sauce on my own personal shelves and giving it to friends. For a lesser sauce, at $10/throw for a 5 oz. bottle, I wouldn't buy it again. Word to the wise.
Bottom line: I have made this a new staple, like the Bourbon-Infused. Also, like the Bourbon-Infused, I am giving some away as gifts for the holidays this year. If those two things aren't enough for a ringing endorsement, there is no such thing. Unlike the Bourbon-Infused, this is a lot more flexible, though there will be many instances where this will not be a preferred sauce, Mexican-food coming immediately to mind. Where it does work well, and there are many instances, it works fantastically.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 4
Flavor: 9
Flexibility: 9
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10
Overall: 9
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Sancto Scorpio Hot Sauce Review
CaJohns Sancto Scorpio Hot Sauce
I've seen a lot of hype about this one, probably because it features somewhat prominently the current record holder for SHU, the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion pepper. I've seen it rated online at as many as a million SHU. Another facet, which I really like, is that a portion of the proceeds go to funding chile research and education at the Chile Pepper Institute in New Mexico. I'm all for furthering science!
Here's where the hype sort of de-rails, though. When talking about Lousiana-style hot sauce, which this is definitely in family of, we're always talking a couple universal factors. First is that it will be a vinegar-based sauce. Second is that it will come with a dropper cap, due to the thinness of the sauce. Check on both counts here, though this is thicker than the Cayenne or Tabasco-based sauces.
So, we're looking at a Trinidad Moruga Scorpion Lousiana-style sauce. No shame in that game, though this is a slightly more complex sauce than many of those I've seen, such as my beloved Red Devil.We have some sugar, lemon and garlic rounding out the bill, which do a nice job of balancing this, but we're talking vinegar and the Scorpion peppers as the respective stars of this show.
You know what you're getting as regards taste, generally, with Lousiana-style sauces and with Trinidad Moruga peppers and this doesn't stray from the path much on either count. We have the nice bite of the vinegar charge and we have the somewhat bitter and flowery taste of the pepper. On first taste, the pepper is more of a grace note, but as is the case with many of the superhot chiles, repeated applications will continue to build and frequently become dominating, which is the case here.
It's using the current recordholder for chile heat in a pepper, so there is definitely some heat here, but it starts subtle and mild initially and builds from there. It never got to the point of uncomfortability or intolerance, even when I used quite a lot of it at once, but rather ascended to a slow and steady nice smooth even heat that was quite pleasant. The heat of this is not rated online (at least not accurately) anywhere I've seen, so I'd put it in the 40K range somewhere, probably in the mids to lower.
Bottom line: If you like Louisiana-style sauces and/or Trinidad Moruga Scorpion peppers, this would be right up your alley. I like the Louisiana sauces, but I'm not quite sure on the peppers yet. I will know by the end of the bottle. I do like the extra kick, but I don't like terribly the residual taste of the Trinidads, which linger a bit longer than I care for and are also dominant during the after-eating belches. I like the thickness of the sauce and the flavor overall, but at $10/5 oz., it's hard to see where, even after I factor in all of the positives of this sauce, that I could realistically find a place for it in my regular rotation. That doesn't mean I wouldn't buy it again (I would), but it's not quite all the way to the point where I would make it a staple.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 6
Flavor: 7
Flexibility: 8
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6
Overall: 7
I've seen a lot of hype about this one, probably because it features somewhat prominently the current record holder for SHU, the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion pepper. I've seen it rated online at as many as a million SHU. Another facet, which I really like, is that a portion of the proceeds go to funding chile research and education at the Chile Pepper Institute in New Mexico. I'm all for furthering science!Here's where the hype sort of de-rails, though. When talking about Lousiana-style hot sauce, which this is definitely in family of, we're always talking a couple universal factors. First is that it will be a vinegar-based sauce. Second is that it will come with a dropper cap, due to the thinness of the sauce. Check on both counts here, though this is thicker than the Cayenne or Tabasco-based sauces.
So, we're looking at a Trinidad Moruga Scorpion Lousiana-style sauce. No shame in that game, though this is a slightly more complex sauce than many of those I've seen, such as my beloved Red Devil.We have some sugar, lemon and garlic rounding out the bill, which do a nice job of balancing this, but we're talking vinegar and the Scorpion peppers as the respective stars of this show.
You know what you're getting as regards taste, generally, with Lousiana-style sauces and with Trinidad Moruga peppers and this doesn't stray from the path much on either count. We have the nice bite of the vinegar charge and we have the somewhat bitter and flowery taste of the pepper. On first taste, the pepper is more of a grace note, but as is the case with many of the superhot chiles, repeated applications will continue to build and frequently become dominating, which is the case here.
It's using the current recordholder for chile heat in a pepper, so there is definitely some heat here, but it starts subtle and mild initially and builds from there. It never got to the point of uncomfortability or intolerance, even when I used quite a lot of it at once, but rather ascended to a slow and steady nice smooth even heat that was quite pleasant. The heat of this is not rated online (at least not accurately) anywhere I've seen, so I'd put it in the 40K range somewhere, probably in the mids to lower.
Bottom line: If you like Louisiana-style sauces and/or Trinidad Moruga Scorpion peppers, this would be right up your alley. I like the Louisiana sauces, but I'm not quite sure on the peppers yet. I will know by the end of the bottle. I do like the extra kick, but I don't like terribly the residual taste of the Trinidads, which linger a bit longer than I care for and are also dominant during the after-eating belches. I like the thickness of the sauce and the flavor overall, but at $10/5 oz., it's hard to see where, even after I factor in all of the positives of this sauce, that I could realistically find a place for it in my regular rotation. That doesn't mean I wouldn't buy it again (I would), but it's not quite all the way to the point where I would make it a staple.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 6
Flavor: 7
Flexibility: 8
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6
Overall: 7
Saturday, December 1, 2012
Testing, As In 5Ws and 1H
I wanted to take a brief moment to discuss how I test sauces. The key word here is: thorough.
To wit:
Who: Me.
What: The sauce in question.
Where: At work, at home, occassionally at play.
Why: To further the information available via this giant big bad grande interwebz
When: Errrr...whenever I get to it.
How: This is the point of this BLOG entry...
I've mentioned earlier that I was looking for a Mexican sauce (more on that in a future entry), but not only cheap crappy Mexican-sorta food (Taco Bell, Del Taco) do I test this one. I also do homemade kick ass Mexican-ish food, such as Panko-holyshit-fish tacos with a homemade slaw. Awesome, even without a sauce. I mentioned chicken strips and pizza. Those are mandatory tests, but it does not stop there. In fact, it winds up being damn near everything. McDonald's cheeseburgers, fries, Wienerschnitzel stuff, which means their version of chili, Marie Callender's dinners, cookies, Hot Pockets, beef jerky, Subway sandwiches, pretty much anything I have around I'll try. There are very foods that can't do with a bit (or more) of spice...
I do this, even after I've completed a review, for the sake of thoroughness. I do this...for you.
To wit:
Who: Me.
What: The sauce in question.
Where: At work, at home, occassionally at play.
Why: To further the information available via this giant big bad grande interwebz
When: Errrr...whenever I get to it.
How: This is the point of this BLOG entry...
I've mentioned earlier that I was looking for a Mexican sauce (more on that in a future entry), but not only cheap crappy Mexican-sorta food (Taco Bell, Del Taco) do I test this one. I also do homemade kick ass Mexican-ish food, such as Panko-holyshit-fish tacos with a homemade slaw. Awesome, even without a sauce. I mentioned chicken strips and pizza. Those are mandatory tests, but it does not stop there. In fact, it winds up being damn near everything. McDonald's cheeseburgers, fries, Wienerschnitzel stuff, which means their version of chili, Marie Callender's dinners, cookies, Hot Pockets, beef jerky, Subway sandwiches, pretty much anything I have around I'll try. There are very foods that can't do with a bit (or more) of spice...
I do this, even after I've completed a review, for the sake of thoroughness. I do this...for you.
Q Heat Chipotle Slam Hot Sauce Review
Blair's Heat Collection Q Heat Chipotle Slam
I think, were someone to say I was a fan of Blair, I would find it a fair assessment. A lot of people credit him for inventing the whole "Superhot" and/or "Chilehead" craze and while I'd consider that something of a stretch, truth be said, he does make some fine sauces. This, however, is maybe the most confusing entry I've come across...
On the label, we have the "funky Q" as the scientific symbol for heat. So far, so good. We have Blair himself, purveyor of absurd levels of heat deliverance while maintaining great taste. Again, very promising. We have a 8.5 oz. bottle of hot sauce for $8, with very prominent chunks, presumably peppers AND a list of peppers that includes habanero, jalapeno, chipotle and cayenne. Forget promising, I'm thinking an unholy value and the deliverance of all that is good and right and spicy in the world.
Damn straight I picked it up when I saw it and then it sat in my closet, while I attended to other sauce matters. Finally, the streak of El Yucateco came to a (sad) close and I had need of some sauce for some Mexi-food and nothing open in the fridge to fit the bill. Time to fire up the blades and bust this bad boy out. My early impression were the Zakk Wylde Original Berzerker sauce minus the crazy garlic aspect. The lime came through a lot more here and I could finally detect hints of cilantro, but holy shit, my man Lazar, where is the goddamn heat? It's somewhat of a marvel that someone can make a sauce like that, utilizing those chiles and come up with such a lack of heat.
Sure, the taste and the blend displays Blair's typical (I say this so far only for him as a sauce artisan) sauce magic and artistry. The level of finesse here is astounding, but goddammit, when someone uses the scientific symbol for heat, I damn well expect some heat to be there. The heat level here is at the level of Red Devil, which is to say, more than not at all, but not a damn sight much.
So, to rationalize things, I say maybe Blair just wanted to test himself, take some peppers and neuter them and just make a well-balanced and somewhat tasty sauce for the candyasses out there. If he could pull it off, it's a feather in his cap as a cook, as a chef, as an artiste. Then I slug through more of the sauce and think what a damn shame it is. This is a good tasting sauce, overall. The lime is a bit heavy and the astringent nature frequently threatens to overpower what you use it on, but put this on some fish tacos and tell me you're not in flavor heaven. If this was even half as much as the Stronger Than Death SHU, I think we're done talking about other people's hot sauces and the new conversation is about making Blair the Food Emperor of the planet.
That's not what we have here, though. What we have here is a decent-tasting sauce, that works very well on certain things and less well, sometimes considerably less well, on everything else. I seriously am confused as to the target market of this. Is it Rubio's or some other purveyor of fish tacos? It's not bad on regular tacos, but it needs something like fish to really shine. It's complex and intriguing, at first, by itself, but the taste quickly wears and approaches boring, due to the distinct lack of heat. Where is the Slam?
Bottom line: Blair is a skilled sauce maker. I take nothing away from the Jersey boy and love his attitude, his approach to business, his dealings with Zakk Wylde and his sauce mastery, all of it, to death (no pun). I seriously don't understand what he's doing with this sauce. There is little to no incentive for a chilehead to buy it -- I've seen the SHU estimated at 800, which I consider accurate and which baffles me further -- and who else but a chilehead will seek out the wares of Mssr. Lazar? It's not in grocery stores and takes some doing to find out its very existence. but shit goddamn, under 1K SHU? So baffled...and never buying this again.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 0
Flavor: 5
Flexibility: 5
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 2
Overall: 3
I think, were someone to say I was a fan of Blair, I would find it a fair assessment. A lot of people credit him for inventing the whole "Superhot" and/or "Chilehead" craze and while I'd consider that something of a stretch, truth be said, he does make some fine sauces. This, however, is maybe the most confusing entry I've come across...On the label, we have the "funky Q" as the scientific symbol for heat. So far, so good. We have Blair himself, purveyor of absurd levels of heat deliverance while maintaining great taste. Again, very promising. We have a 8.5 oz. bottle of hot sauce for $8, with very prominent chunks, presumably peppers AND a list of peppers that includes habanero, jalapeno, chipotle and cayenne. Forget promising, I'm thinking an unholy value and the deliverance of all that is good and right and spicy in the world.
Damn straight I picked it up when I saw it and then it sat in my closet, while I attended to other sauce matters. Finally, the streak of El Yucateco came to a (sad) close and I had need of some sauce for some Mexi-food and nothing open in the fridge to fit the bill. Time to fire up the blades and bust this bad boy out. My early impression were the Zakk Wylde Original Berzerker sauce minus the crazy garlic aspect. The lime came through a lot more here and I could finally detect hints of cilantro, but holy shit, my man Lazar, where is the goddamn heat? It's somewhat of a marvel that someone can make a sauce like that, utilizing those chiles and come up with such a lack of heat.
Sure, the taste and the blend displays Blair's typical (I say this so far only for him as a sauce artisan) sauce magic and artistry. The level of finesse here is astounding, but goddammit, when someone uses the scientific symbol for heat, I damn well expect some heat to be there. The heat level here is at the level of Red Devil, which is to say, more than not at all, but not a damn sight much.
So, to rationalize things, I say maybe Blair just wanted to test himself, take some peppers and neuter them and just make a well-balanced and somewhat tasty sauce for the candyasses out there. If he could pull it off, it's a feather in his cap as a cook, as a chef, as an artiste. Then I slug through more of the sauce and think what a damn shame it is. This is a good tasting sauce, overall. The lime is a bit heavy and the astringent nature frequently threatens to overpower what you use it on, but put this on some fish tacos and tell me you're not in flavor heaven. If this was even half as much as the Stronger Than Death SHU, I think we're done talking about other people's hot sauces and the new conversation is about making Blair the Food Emperor of the planet.
That's not what we have here, though. What we have here is a decent-tasting sauce, that works very well on certain things and less well, sometimes considerably less well, on everything else. I seriously am confused as to the target market of this. Is it Rubio's or some other purveyor of fish tacos? It's not bad on regular tacos, but it needs something like fish to really shine. It's complex and intriguing, at first, by itself, but the taste quickly wears and approaches boring, due to the distinct lack of heat. Where is the Slam?
Bottom line: Blair is a skilled sauce maker. I take nothing away from the Jersey boy and love his attitude, his approach to business, his dealings with Zakk Wylde and his sauce mastery, all of it, to death (no pun). I seriously don't understand what he's doing with this sauce. There is little to no incentive for a chilehead to buy it -- I've seen the SHU estimated at 800, which I consider accurate and which baffles me further -- and who else but a chilehead will seek out the wares of Mssr. Lazar? It's not in grocery stores and takes some doing to find out its very existence. but shit goddamn, under 1K SHU? So baffled...and never buying this again.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 0
Flavor: 5
Flexibility: 5
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 2
Overall: 3
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