Double Comfort Memphis Heat Hot Sauce Review

Double Comfort Memphis Heat

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mE7BLCoGqGQ

The name of this sort of reminded me of the differentiation that various barbeque cities were doing, back when I was a more avid follower of that scene. You had your Carolina, your St. Louis, your Texas, and, of course, your Memphis, all of them with interesting regional variations in flavor. Memphis is not, of course, totally removed from Nashville, and their "Hot" craze for styling on chicken strips, either with or without waffles. In some respects, I think this sauce draws neatly from both scenes a bit. 

We have what is, at heart, probably closest in existing stylings, to a Cajun sauce, wherein there is either platform or strong aspect of Cayenne, then loaded in with all sorts of other stuff, most typically garlic. This goes several steps further, both by rather notably standing on the heat with Habaneros (Chocolate, unless I miss my guess, which also gives this its gorgeous brownish hue), along with some sugar and some onion powder, which really do an ace job of rounding out the complexity and giving this a very nice depth of flavor. The heat may be enough to push some normies, but it also could be very useful as a tolerance builder, as this sauce is tasty enough to want to keep going, despite the build.

I don't know enough about the regions to comment if Memphis is in "the south" or not, though I will note this sauce company is out of Columbus, OH, but the sauce is targeted towards a lot of Southern staples, with what suggests to me a strong lean towards Creole flavors. I have no doubt it would fit right in there, as well as doing nicely with barbeque, which would separate it from the Louisiana-style and Cajun styles. Perhaps this is a shot at Memphis getting its own category as far as hot sauces, as it does with barbeque.

For me, I use it interchangeably where I would use the Louisiana-styles, though I think it does have a touch more flexibility. It is definitely very vinegar forward, but has a nice blend of the Habaneros and Cayenne, along with a strong undercurrent of those other flavors I mentioned. It has a wonderful flavor quite its own and has been one of the happier surprises of the year so far. And, as if all of that wasn't enough, 100% of the profits from this company are sent to charity.

Bottom line: One of those rare sauces that comes along, which presents a new flavorful take, with moderate heat.

 Breakdown:

           Heat level: 2
           Flavor: 10
           Flexibility: 7
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10

Overall: 7

Black Panther Party Burn Baby Burn Revolutionary Hot Sauce Review

Black Panther Party Burn Baby Burn Revolutionary Hot Sauce

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FFltNDjuvxI

Very wordy title for this hot sauce and yes, it is associated with the Black Panther organization. We do have a very strong throwback vibe to this sauce in the label, which I like quite a bit, all the way down to a 60's era stylized font. As for the sauce...

Well, I wasn't around in the 60's, of course, and can't really speak to sauces, but to my knowledge, Habaneros were nowhere near as big of a thing until the past three or four decades. Indeed, a world's hottest, which was a Habanero, wasn't crowned "officially" by Guinness until 1994. So, is it possible that nearly 30 years prior to that, someone in the Black Panther Party was using them in a hot sauce, as this particular sauce is said to be the product of said recipe? Sure, but I don't know that I would call it likely.

If anything, I'd be more inclined to call this a relabel. While I'm not saying it is (but I'm also not not saying it is), the ingredient list is identical to a sauce I did in 2014 from Arizona Gunslinger, which was their Habanero sauce (http://d-dubtsaaf.blogspot.com/2014/02/arizona-gunslinger-habanero-pepper-hot.html), all the way down to the order. It also comes with a restrictor cap as does that sauce. The consistency and color are also very, very close. That one does not list as Organic, but they do have a different division/sister company (Arizona Peppers), which does have an entire line of certified organic products. They also have a near-identical flavor profile and heat level. Again, I'm not saying anything one way or the other, but perhaps the biggest piece to support that idea is that both sauces suffer from the exact same problem, that of high saltiness, to the point where it overshadows the sauce entirely.

Most of that review also applies here. Heat is fairly moderate. Habanero is very forward, after the salt, and if the salt was cut in half, this would be a considerably better product. As it is, like the other, it is borderline unusable, unless you really like both salt and Habanero flavors. As Habanero is not one of my favorite peppers overall and a little salt goes a long way with me, this is a huge miss for me. 

Bottom line: If you have a dish that needs both salt and a slight amount of heat, this is probably useful (like in a chili possibly). By itself, it can be a bit hard to take.

 Breakdown:

           Heat level: 1
           Flavor: 3
           Flexibility: 5
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 3

Overall: 3

Wicked Provisions Yellow Jacket Hot Sauce Review

Wicked Provisions Yellow Jacket

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BAiJP2V12s

Hailing from Texas, we have a sauce that piqued my immediate interest as soon as I came across it. The idea of naming it after an insect is one that is a tried and steady habit of Pex Peppers, whom I believe has a similarly named sauce, however, for this one, they also make it a point to emphasize the grilled pineapple component, which was the more exciting part for me. I like grilling stuff and will grill just about any old thing, food-wise, that is, just to try it out, so fruits like apples (not enough moisture), tomatoes, peppers (of course), berries (don't bother), citrus (interesting, surprisingly) and a host of other stuff has all hit those hot grates at one time or another. The one hitting is most consistently has definitely been the pineapple, though, and indeed, that has been one of my favorite things to have at a churrascaria. So, there was no way I was not going to get this, after I'd made sure there were no onions, of course.

I did have a slight bit of pause with the apple cider vinegar and the ginger, two flavors that can wreak havoc in anything sort of subtly flavored, which I find pineapple generally to be. The ginger has no real bearing here, but regrettably, the apple cider vinegar reared its stinky foot-flavor aspect more prominently than I would have wished. The rest of it, the citrus juice, the Habaneros, and the grilled pineapple, combine to make a light and lively flavor, another thing I was wondering about, since the way I grill pineapple (and have it at the aforementioned restaurants) tends to have a heavier concentration of flavor and a lot of the carmelizing from the Maillard effect. That is not really the case here.

The heat here is a bit on the light side, but given the sort of effervescent quality of the sauce overall, tends to always surprise me by being a bit higher than anticipated. For all of that, though, it is definitely on the lower side of things. On pizza, which was the main application I had in mind for this, the apple cider vinegar isn't quite as detrimental, but put it on a lighter meat fried food and it tends to come through a bit more. Texture-wise, this is a lot like a puree and it reminds me a bit of an apple sauce, only from pineapple instead.

Bottom line: I like the concept of this a lot, much more than I liked the actual sauce. It's not unpalatable or anything and I will finish the bottle, but they could have had something unique and spectacular instead of what's here, which is underwhemlingly okayish.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 7
            Flexibility: 4
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 5

Overall: 4

Volcanic Peppers Cranky Cranberry Hot Sauce Review

Volcanic Peppers Cranky Cranberry Cherry Bomb Pepper Sauce

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jLQr0hcnss

So, here it is, my 500th overall post on this blog and I think it's fitting that not only is this one of the most delicious sauces I've had, but also far and away my favorite this year (yes, I know it's early), easily the best hot sauce with cranberry in it I've ever had, but also one that speaks very directly to my particular taste favorites. I love cranberry, the whole one, out of the can, with just the cranberries and sugar and that's it. I don't need orange and other junk polluting the flavor, but this sauce represents the ultimate of what tinkering with cranberries (even though I don't think they need tinkering) could achieve, even though they're not going for a cranberry sauce per se.

Here we have the delicious Cherry Bomb peppers. I love Cherry peppers. Both of those are some of my favorite pods (there are actually quite a lot...if I ever figure out the tier list thing, I will definitely do an FOH video with pods) and here they're used to great effect with the cranberries. Red Habaneros are here for heat, but it is pretty moderate. Red Anaheims also show up and this is a good demonstration of what can often be the fruitiness of red peppers. The brilliance of this sauce is the restraint of whoever came up with it to allow it to showcase those things and allow it to unfold, rather than polluting it with a bunch of other ingredients. Rather brilliantly executed, though I do kind of thing the xanthan gum probably could have been skipped. 

Because cranberries figures into things, I think this naturally limits a bit where the sauce is going to work. Cranberries and turkey is a pairing we all know and (probably) love, but it works as well with chicken and I suspect would work well with other fowl also. It is not an aggressively cranberry-forward sauce, which is good as the quinine can turn things overly bitter if not used delicately, but there is enough that I wouldn't expect it to work on pork or ham or beef and probably not really on fish, either. Now, having said all of that, I won't be able to find out because this is one of the fastest sauces I've whipped through. As of this writing, I literally opened the bottle yesterday and had to make it a point to film today (FOH video won't be posted until March 2023, though), so as to have enough left. The bottle is nearly empty, which I guess rather amply demonstrates just how much I love this sauce.

Bottom line: There are things that speak directly to one and then there is stuff like this, that shouts. Just an absolutely fantastic sauce, deftly combining cranberries and one of the best-tasting pepper pods out there.

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 6

Pisqueya Spicy Sweet Hot Sauce Review

Pisqueya Spicy Sweet

Note: This sauce appears on Season 22 of The Hot Ones.

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJC6XiTLN1g

Sometimes coincidences are fascinating. Skip ahead a couple paragraphs if you're not interested so much in story time. Take, for example, the Bravado Manuka Honey Passion Fruit hot sauce (reviewed elsewhere here). I was not familiar with Manuka honey specifically, but figured it was like any other honey and do a lot of FOH content for spicy honeys (there is a playlist to your right, if interested). Honey in hot sauce can often be quite good and while not super-versed in passion fruit, I figured, hey, tropical fruit, should be interesting. It was, but not in a pleasant way. I get into it a lot more in the review and accompanying video, but there was an off-flavor I found extremely off-putting.

So, shortly after I wound up filming, then binning that sauce, I received a spicy Manuka honey product I had ordered before the Bravado sauce arrived. That particular product, which will eventually be posted and in the Spicy Honey playlist I mentioned, did not have a very forceful off-flavor and by then, of course, I was pretty interested in tracking down what was causing that, so I could try to never experience it again. This sauce I picked up solely because it was on The Hot Ones show and only realized later it featured passion fruit. 

So, what we have here seems a lot like an attempt to jump into the very well-established territory of tropical fruit-based sweet-hots. Most of those tend to be either mango or pineapple and this is clearly aimed at that, but for me, it's a pretty hard no-go. For, you see, I have discovered the source of the off-flavor, which was strongly pleasant here. To spare you going back and either re-reading the review or watching the video for the other sauce I mentioned (though I would love it if you did one or both), there is a flavor that comes across as medicine-y. If you're a beer homebrewer who has had an infected batch or if you've otherwise experienced an infected beer, you'll know what I mean and since passion fruit is the first ingredient, it's pretty prominent here.

Interestingly, this sauce does not have vinegar listed, instead relying on both lemon and salt to act more as preservatives (I presume). The notes I dislike seem to wax and wane as I go through the bottle, so I'd definitely suggest a lot of agitation with this one. Unfortunately, I could not really find an application where I liked the flavor, so this is ultimately a miss for me and will probably be binned after the Q1 2024 Wing Thing video. Heat-wise, it is virtually non-existent. This sauce label has the very annoying habit of not specifying the specific peppers (though others in the line-up from this company do), but this does not rise, for me, to even the level of one.

Bottom line: This is one of those I find incompatible with my palate, but if you really like passion fruit, this is probably worth giving a go. 

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 0
            Flavor: 2
            Flexibility: 0
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 0

Overall: 0

Karma Ashes 2 Ashes Hot Sauce Review

Karma Ashes 2 Ashes

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ht6bBkVVBCk

This is one I meant to get posted in 2023, but I bought it, then it sat on the shelf for a while because I tend to limit how many bottles of absolute scorchers I have open at one time (this does not count the ones I keep in reserve for the quarterly wing things I shoot for the FOH YouTube video series - check playlist on right, if interested). It is, in many ways, the ultimate hot sauce, because it is definitely blazing, both immediately and then progressively with the build the 7-Pot likes to have, but is so delicious one cannot help but keep going. Meanwhile, the flames continue to rise...

I enjoy the flavor of 7-Pot Primos pretty considerably. I think, at this point, they’re probably my 2nd favorite superhot (not sure the Ghosties will ever be dethroned, but as I have Primos more and more in sauces, I’m a lot less certain), supplanting the Reapers and the vast majority of the other stuff out there. These are a bit deceptive in that they can seem a touch tame at first, and allow you to really dig into the flavor, before doing a nice build and before you know it, your entire mouth is ablaze. I really admire that.

Here, we have that wonderful flavor paired with a nice bit of sweetness, along with a hint of smokiness from the Chipotle. There is also a touch of lemon in there, that I could have done without, but it is mainly the Primos, in a sweet setting, that is the star here. This is, by far, my favorite thing from Karma and I find it delicious, especially given how prominent the Primos are and how little effort is made to move away from them being front and center. I will note that depending on application, this can be a bit of too much of a good thing. One of my favorite things about this blog is really cementing the idea firmly, confirming over and over again, that flavor and flexibility are inherently tied together and this one is yet another model of that.

Heat-wise, this is chilehead only territory. Lots of warnings on the bottle, presumably to scare away the normies, who should definitely not tinker with this. At the lower levels of tolerance, it is a lot more challenging to pick out the flavor notes with the distraction of a mouthful of blast furnace, but for those of us who are well-seasoned chileheads, there are a lot of excellent nuances here. I found this good in every setting I tried it in, but was especially fond of it on pizzas, burgers, and chicken tendies.

Bottom line: The 2nd hottest sauce in the Karma lineup, behind only the Burn After Eating (reviewed elsewhere here), this is not only punishingly hot, but probably the best-flavored entry in the entire Karma lineup...and another SOTY candidate. Definitely chileheads only, though.

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 8

Adoboloco Pineapple Hot Sauce Review

Adoboloco Pineapple

 Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlTjXiciJKI

The first sauce from them I’ve done that wasn’t on the Hot Ones show, at least not yet, and it is one that I mentally pictured in my mind anytime I had the thought of a pineapple-Habanero sauce. Indeed, this one is essentially a doctored pineapple puree, with garlic, salt, and Habanero pepper powder added, then with a bit of vinegar to dial down the sweetness. Despite having used this quite a bit in different applications, it is invariably less sweet than I expect it to be, so for me, they may gone a bit far here.

If this sounds like something straining a bit at the boundaries of what a “sauce” is, I’d tend to agree. Because it is so thick and fiber-y, it is difficult to diffuse all of the powdered ingredients equally, so there are times the sauce will be a bit saltier, or garlic-y, or perhaps a small burst of Habanero powder heat, but that it is relatively consistent overall is somewhat of a marvel.

I figured if someone was going to do a pineapple-Habanero sauce correctly, it would probably be someone from Hawaii, and this, if nothing else satisfied my curiousity about how a pineapple puree would work in this context. While I would have strongly preferred actual Habanero pepper itself be used, rather than in powder form, this does get the point across quite effectively. Heat-wise, this is quite low.

Happily, for me, I generally adore pineapple, and have enjoyed this sauce thoroughly. It is fantastic on any of the lighter meats, or on pizza, perhaps particularly on pizza, at least the red sauce pizzas. Generally anywhere you like pineapple, this sauce will do quite well in. Back during my heavy drinking days, I used to make a compound after hearing a description of it in an E-40 song. That beverage was called “slurricane” and it was pineapple juice, (maybe coconut), Triple Sec, 151 rum, white rum, and a little bit of grenadine, and I used to mix up a lot of that. While this isn’t quite sweet enough for that, it did lend the idea that I should probably give it a go in some drinks of some kind, maybe try to make a pina colada type thing.

Bottom line: This sauce was both entirely and not at all what I was expecting when I bought it, and it has been one of the more fun sauces I’ve had to play around with. This is one where you definitely have to like pineapple to enjoy.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 7
            Flexibility: 4
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8

Overall: 5

Angry Goat Blistered Shishito & Garlic Hot Sauce Review

Angry Goat Blistered Shishito & Garlic

Note: This sauce appears on Season 22 of The Hot Ones.

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tMscJfJmgag

*Sigh* [Heavy sigh] Ok, well, no getting around it. As much as I hate to be the bearer of this kind of commentary, especially when it hits one of my darling sauce companies, it does bolster the point I’ve said in the past that anyone can make a bad sauce. I don’t know that I would necessarily quantify this as a bad sauce so much as it being a bad hot sauce, more specifically, or, even more narrowly, not particularly a “hot” sauce at all, but I can’t say it’s good. I suppose charitably I will just say that it missed the mark pretty widely.

Of all the pods I’ve eaten over the last decade or so, discounting Sweet, Cherry, and Bell peppers, it probably has been Shishitos, almost exclusively at restaurants, as if I see them at all on a menu, at any time, I will always, but always, order them. The higher end Japanese restaurants, particularly those at the top as far as sushi goes, invariably have the best one and it is largely just 3 ingredients: Shishitos (blistered, of course), sesame oil, kosher salt. As it is mostly a dish featuring balance and umami, nothing else is needed and there those peppers shine.

I admit to no small degree of nervousness when I saw that they were being used in a sauce, as I can’t imagine them doing well there. They are quite thin-walled peppers, without much density of flavor, and not particularly versatile nor hot. Indeed, only out of twenty or so has any heat at all to them. Jalapenos are added here to bolster the pepper flavor (and I suppose, if you can call it that, the heat), but it is still quite minimal, largely drowned out by a huge misstep of inclusion to the ingredient list, that of dried minced garlic. A little of that goes a very long way and despite it being the second-to-last ingredient here, it is, far and away, the most prominent. If you like the flavor of the jarred garlic, this will be better to you, but for me, the concentration and the additional flavor element where it departs considerably from fresh or, most preferably, roasted and carmelized garlic, is a bit of harshness I would rather not have in dishes generally, let alone when you’re trying to play with a subtly-flavored pepper, such as the Shishito.

So, we have here no heat and a rather harsh and strong garlic flavor, along with a bit of green rawness when there is pepper flavor. Naturally, this makes this somewhat abrasive concoction a bit of a challenge to use and I found it best when it was either pared with something uncomplicated but of equal strength flavor that already has garlic, such as chicken tendies, or where that unwelcome garlic note can be cooked out of it. Flavor-wise, given that I like garlic, I don’t find it overly offensive, but it definitely needs to be in the right setting. Also, like all sauces with oil in them, the warmer the sauce when you consume, the better off you’ll be.

Bottom line: If you don’t like garlic quite a lot, or you love the purity of Shishitos, or you want some actual heat in your hot sauce, you can skip this one and save yourself the disappointment. 

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 0
            Flavor: 4
            Flexibility: 3
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 1

Overall: 2

Silk City Shake And Pour Over Hot Sauce Review

Silk City Shake And Pour Over

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCj4S-xqpzU

Mastermind Jeff Levine has done it again, with another banger entry into an already impressive list of entries over the years. Here, we have a label directly either parodying or paying homage, honestly not entirely sure which, to the cover and titles of the seminal KISS album from 1976, coming on the heels of the equally seminal preceding Destroyer record of the same year, nearly six months to the day.

Inside, we have a sauce strongly reminiscent of the Badass Jew (reviewed elsewhere here) hot sauce, though this one has a touch more sweetness and a touch less pepper flavor than did the other. It is worth noting that the other one was a SOTY contender in one of the more competitive years of this blog, which will shortly have some bearing for this sauce. The Shake & Pour Over is a bit lighter and maybe a tad runnier than I remember the other being, but they are overall quite close. In a lot of respects, if this sauce was reduced down a bit, I think you’d have a fine spaghetti sauce, though I’m not going to attempt it. I might suggest that Jeff, should he happen across these scribbles, considering doing that, though, as I think it would be fantastic and perhaps a bold new addition. Spike the heat very slightly upward and you’d have a very solid arrabiata sauce, for instance.

As I said, I won’t be attempting it, as this sauce is delicious in nearly every application in which I’ve tried it, sans Mexican or Asian food. It is accessible enough that I suspect it wouldn’t necessarily be bad in either, though assuredly not to my preference. One of the attributes that sauces utilizing tomato all seem to share is this sort of cross-food platform flexibility and this definitely falls into that category. Heat-wise, we’re dealing strictly with Habaneros, as far as I’ve been able to find, and at that, in the middle of the ingredient list, so heat is quite moderate. This is not only a great introduction to Silk City itself, but could be a fantastic gateway sauce for those chilehead curious, as it both delivers a fairly low and slow heat, but the flavor is fantastic as well.

Bottom line: Somewhat unusually, first post a new year and we already have our first Sauce Of The Year candidate, but for a sauce that packs this much great flavor and value into a bottle, from one of the more consistently inventive makers out there, it would be hard for this not to be in contention.

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 8