2K24 Q1 Update

2K24 Q1 Update

I’ve decided that this year, in addition to trying to match FOH video content on YouTube to various holidays, only partially successfully in years past, to, this time, pick some random holidays out and find videos that might actually fit them. I realize I don’t have enough to a following for this to be super meaningful, but it’s fun and even if it’s only a secret thrill for me to hold most of it as a surprise until it goes live, it’s an indulgence I will grant myself. The list is on the YouTube Community tab of my channel (you can get to the page by following any of the Playlist links at right and then going to my YouTube home page), if you’re interested in the latest updates, but so far, here are the days I have stuff planned coming in the days ahead for 2024:

April 1 - April (Fiery) Fool's Day
April 4 - Ramen Day
April 26 - National Pretzel Day
May 4 - IYKYK
May 18 - Chris Cornell RIP
May 29 - Memorial Day
June 12 - National Jerky Day
June 20 - Summer Solstice
July 4 - Independence Day
August 4 - National Chocolate Chip Cookie Day
August 6 - National Mustard Day
Sept 2 - Labor Day
Sept 23 - National Snack (Meat) Stick Day
Oct 21 - National Worm Day
Oct 28  - National Chocolate Day
Oct 31 - Diablo Double Feature
Nov 14 - National Pickle Day

I’ll probably update this list in the Q3 update, though I don’t really have anything planned outside of the “usual” holiday stuff I normally do for November/December.

A lot of being a chilehead is a process of refinement. While that is manifested a bit more directly with the creative endeavors of these written reviews and the FOH video series, it extends a bit beyond that. Case in point: One of my previous customs was, every December, to try to cut down the amount of open bottles lingering in my fridge door. In years past, that selection of bottles of varying levels went beyond the usual top shelf (where I generally keep things in current rotation), overflowing beyond the bottom shelf, where I hold the sauces I want for the quarterly FOH Wing Things (a video tour of my refrigerator door is in one of those Wing Things, by the by, link to the playlist at right), right into the middle shelf, which is where everything else not hot sauce goes, so mustard, mayo, pickles, various Asian sauces, grill sauces, etc. This would be less of a problem now, as I don’t share the refrigerator with anyone else these days, but that wasn’t the case when I started the blog and for much of my life before that.

I think New Year’s is something that culturally we’re conditioned to see as an opportunity for renewal, to start the next calendar year fresh, so to speak, so at the end of December, I’d have a purge for those sauces that hung in there, always waiting for me to get around to finding something to pair them with to finish, but accumulating as I found more appealing sauces and cranked though those. It always kind of bothered me, though, as I hate being wasteful and while life is too short for bad sauces, as I always say, it was, if nothing else, a waste of money that I’d spent if not enjoying the entirety of the bottle in return. So, I always had this on the backburner to remedy. I came close for several years, but it wasn’t until 2023 that I finally ended the year without having a single bottle to toss. None of the shelves were full to the brim as I started off 2024, either.

This January started off on fire. It saw not just one, but two, SOTY candidates, on the way to 6 consecutive hot sauce reviews, the last of which was this blog’s 500th overall post, quite unplanned, but the streak was something I don’t think I’ve ever done before. So, I was cautiously optimistic for the year. Then, naturally, tragedy struck. Continuing the trend of starting off even-years badly in January, which began in 2020, for this year, I finally ran out of luck and acquired COVID-19, which was highly obnoxious, and came shortly after I made the 500th blog post. I guess that is one of the good things about being so far ahead on video content, though, as I was able to take time off to recover without having to also worry about filming new stuff. The blog has no set schedule, so that was never going to be a problem, but if you were wondering why the frenetic pace of the early part of the month suddenly dropped off, that’s why. Definitely, make sure you are vaxxed and boosted as much as can be (I was short one booster total) and I found having albuterol at hand to be enormously helpful. This did create a lot of havoc with the challenges I was planning, as it rather handily reset the tolerance I was building, which I then spent most of February re-building in order to try to film the challenges in March.

All of the challenges I had are filmed now and will appear sporadically on the YT channel in 2024, some of which are on the schedule I posted earlier. Two of them were ½ pound chocolate bars from Willy Pete, neither of which induced much more than very mild cap cramping after the fact. Part of this has to do with my higher tolerance, keyed somewhat pointedly at Reapers, I feel a pretty significant part, maybe a larger part, has to do with my prep being really dialed in, nearly to the point where I’m debating filming an advice video, which will not include my specific methods (I need to get paid on the YouTubes before I’m going to post that kind of thing, as it took me a while to develop to get to this point), but just some general guidance if anyone’s going to attempt these. I guess if there’s enough interest, I can whip one up. If you want to see this, let me know.

Speaking of challenges, since I don’t really do them frequently, it was kind of interesting, the entire process of ramping up tolerance and then maintaining it, with just stuff I had at hand. I tinkered a bit with prep (and action for relief, if cramping got too high) and it was quite a bit more engaging than I’d ever suspected. It certainly won’t become a regular thing with me, but I’m definitely happier I did it now than when I started. As to those challenges themselves, two of them involved both heat and volume. The first one went a lot smoother and easier than expected, but I’m definitely done attempting those again, most likely. It’s just a huge influx of sugar for both of them and I’ve done that kind of things three times now and that’s a pretty good number to stop at. I am going to continue to look at challenges and if I find any I think are 1) interesting, 2) potentially tasty or at least not awful) and 3) do-able, I’ll probably give those a whack. I have one sort of on the back burner for 2024, if I can find it, and then that might be back to the dry spell for challenges again.

In January, I figured since I was doing some challenges for the FOH video series, I may as well make a new playlist (link at right). I then made another in February strictly for chocolate bars, since I’ve been doing so many of those. And then also hit my 500th overall review (counting both mini and full reviews) here on the blog in February. And then yet another playlist in March for meats and cheeses, which turned out to be a lot larger than I had anticipated. Links to all of those playlists at right.

As I mentioned in the Year End wrap up for 2023 (posted end of December), the FOH video series had some momentum. If it keeps that going, in addition to having more videos than posts here, which it already does, it will have more cumulative views. I kind of expected this, because blogs, while maybe not dead outright, definitely do not enjoy their earlier popularity and YouTube has been hotter for quite a while. On a side note, I still, as of right now, have content that is a year old (slightly over) that is not yet posted, but it is minimal compared to other years and should be caught up by next Quarterly update. I’m doing pretty well on not having a huge backlog for this year, since that kind of spacing creates some challenges on the back end and have easily enough non-sauce content to run through this year handily.

In some ways, the disparity between the FOH series on YouTube and here raises the question of why bother at all with the blog. This is my labor of love and the thinking is that perhaps people will check out videos and there will be some pull through. This was always meant to be archival in nature, a big, grand, vast library, much larger than I ever anticipated, to be sure, but still a joy to do...and I still have a lot of sauces on the hit list yet to get to...I suppose one day I will run dry, but until then, lots more to discover.

Finally, as I mentioned in the blog some last year, we seem to be cycling back off of “hot” products and stuff intended more for a chilehead market as far as the commercial sector, so fast food, grocery store items, etc. 2024 so far has been pretty dry, outside of a few Hot Ones tie-in products, which I may or may not get to. Access seems easier than some of the other stuff, but ye gawds, the price point...stay tuned for those, I guess...maybe.

Colorful Colorado Creations Colorado Red Extreme Hot Sauce Review

C3 Colorado Red Extreme

Note: This sauce was provided for purposes of review by Roger Damptz at Burn Your Tongue, greatest hot sauce dispensary on the planet. Check him out on Facebook. 

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

I *almost* bought this when I picked up instead the Colorado Red (reviewed elsewhere here) from this same company in the later fall part of 2023. I had them both in my hands, but decided my entry point for a new company should probably be in the sauce that wasn't meant to be a piledriver. I figured it that one was any good, I would pick this one up or, more accurately, I would pick it up anyone once I'd dialed my tolerance up a bit. As it turned out, despite not really loving the other sauce and struggling a bit to find places to use it, I wound up picking this one up despite that less than auspicious showing.

This sauce is an absolute dynamo and couldn't be more different from the other, which is odd, given that this is named as the more "extreme" version of the other. They are factually nearly completely different sauces. While they both utilize a few of the same ingredients, the Fresnos come immediately to mind, this one is like a somewhat less vinegar forward version of a Louisiana-style or Cajun, just a whole lot more punchy and with some very nice grace notes of black pepper kicking around.

This is, however, a definitely blazing sauce, meant strictly for chileheads. It comes with a restrictor cap, which I didn't mind, for reason I'll get into shortly, but even with that, I can't imagine many non-chileheads enjoying this much. The main sort of issue I have with this is in flavor balance. When using black pepper, then also using a chile powder rather than the actual pepper, you run the risk of creating a high prominence of bitter flavor notes, particularly if that pepper happens to be a superhot as it is here. For me, this sauce winds up frequently being overly bitter, which the restrictor cap did a decent enough job of helping me control. What I think I'd like to see here is one of two things: either the addition of a bit of sugar to temper that bitterness or perhaps using pods instead of powder on the Reaper side. I don't think I've run across too many times when I've run across Reaper powder and enjoyed it, though I think the peppers do have a great flavor and have enjoyed many sauces with that component in it. Not so much on the powder side.

I will say also that this is one of the more flexible sauces I've come across. I wound up using this on the obligatory fried foods, and cream dishes, given the resemblance, to me, of the two sauce types I noted above, but additionally, it was quite good on pizza and burgers as well. In a pinch, I think it's probably neutral enough to at least be passable in Asian dishes, but I'd probably draw the line at Mexican food, given that I tend to dislike vinegar-forward sauces in that setting and there's enough here for me to be dissuaded. This was one of the sauces I used to help me build tolerance when I was prepping for some challenges, so there is that aspect as well.

Bottom line: This is a dynamo of a sauce, very aggressively punchy heat, with some excellent flavor notes of Fresno and black pepper. If you're a chilehead who likes Louisiana-style or Cajun sauces but wish they were less vinegary, this is definitely worth a go.

Breakdown:

           Heat level: 3
           Flavor: 8
           Flexibility: 8
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8

Overall: 7

CaJohn's Monster Series Quad-Review

CaJohn's Rougaroux
CaJohn's Leviathan
CaJohn's Cerberus
CaJohn's Hydra

Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOpSt1_kOLw

This is probably the one and only time I'll be doing this, which is what I said after the last multi-review, which featured a number of sauces from Flashpoint, all variations on a theme, but it is exactly that, variations on a theme, which I guess, in my mind, makes this a more fitting setting, even if I sort of dislike it in practice. Here we have 4 of the 5 sauces of the CaJohn's "Monster" line, the fifth and not present sauce being El Chupacabra, which has onions and thus merits its non-inclusion. I can't speak to that one, but 3 of these share a commonality of secondary ingredients, with varying peppers as the main ingredients being changed out. Those ingredients are: vinegar, garlic, Scorpion, sugar, salt, "spices," and lemon extract. How the peppers interact with those ingredients, in particular either the Scorpion peppers or powder, whichever is present, and the lemon extract, varies, but I will say that the three sauces with this facet would be notably better without the Scorpion and lemon extract. The Cerberus, which does not have either, comes off considerably better, in my view, because of that lack. 

The application for all of these is the same, which is the same vein as a Louisana-style or Cajun vinegar-forward sauce and part of the reason I decided to do the review this way, which is weighted from lowest to hottest heat, by the by, is because when I was doing testing, it was usually all 4 of them at once, on the same food items, in an attempt to differentiate their identities. What I found was that, aside from the Cerberus, there is not much differentiation to be had. They are all generally the same in loose consistency, with the addition of a bit of grit in the Rougaroux being perhaps the main textural difference between them. The Cerberus was definitely its own thing and we'll get into that more as this progresses.

I opened all four of these for a video I was doing called the Lavapuff Challenge and it was my third video in that series (it is in the Challenges playlist at right), and the Rougaroux was one I initially liked quite a bit. I don't tend to actually review sauces upon initial opening, though, as they tend to change and that's exactly what happened with this one. Featuring predominantly yellow peppers, this slightly gritty and very astringent sauce, rather neatly wrecks the Scotch Bonnets in it by overpowering them with the highly floral notes of the Scorpion and Fatalii peppers, and unpleasantly enhanced with the lemon extract. This is one I kept long enough to shoot the video and then binned immediately after, with maybe half of it gone. Heat-wise, it is definitely punchy, on the lower side of a 2, so definitely a challenge for a non-chilehead.
Rougaroux Breakdown:

           Heat level: 2
           Flavor: 2
           Flexibility: 2
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 1

Overall: 2

The Leviathan, conversely, based on the Chocolate Habaneros, a pepper I generally tend to like, fared the poorest of all of them on initial opening. Over time, however, this turned into one that I thought fairly highly of. Heat is somewhat higher than the Rougaroux, figure maybe a mid-2, but we also have the nice richness and depth of those Chocolate Habs, before the Scorpions and lemon extract inevitably rear their ugly heads. This is one, like the Hydra, that I will be slow-walking and may or may not finish the bottle.

Leviathan Breakdown:

           Heat level: 2
           Flavor: 5
           Flexibility: 4
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 4

Overall: 4

 

Before we get to the Hydra, which was the hottest of the lot, we have the surprising Cerberus. Given that it was both the mighty, mighty Reaper and 7-Pot Primo, along with Douglahs, I expected this one to be the hottest of the bunch and it definitely is chilehead-only territory, a very strong 3, it is not the punch I had expected. It is the thickest of the batch and this one thankfully forgoes the lemon and Scorpion and is by far the best-tasting of the bunch. It is quite chili-forward and you can really get a good feel of both the Reaper and 7-Pot Primo flavors, although it tends more towards the Reapers. This one is my overall favorite of the lot here and not just because I like the color of the sauce the best. I will go so far as to say that if it was just slightly sweeter, this one would be something special. As it is, it's just much better by comparison here. One bit of oddness here is that this one tends to get very harsh in the back of my throat, which I find rather odd.

Cerberus Breakdown:

           Heat level: 3
           Flavor: 8
           Flexibility: 6
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6

Overall: 6

Last up is the Hydra, which was meant to just be 7-Pot Primos. Maybe even at one time that's all it ever was. Here though, it gets the dreadful base mentioned in the first paragraph and it rather neatly ruins this sauce. You can get traces of the 7-Pot, but it's ultimately beat to death at the hands of flowery Scorpions and lemon extract, which is a shame. This one is easily the hottest, coming in at a 4.That heat level, along with the ghostly off-notes, makes this good for a tolerance builder and little else, sad to say. 

Hydra Breakdown:

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

Overall: 4

HAB Murder Mango Hot Sauce Review

HAB Murder Mango

Note: This sauce was provided for purposes of review by Roger Damptz of Burn Your Tongue, legendary hot sauce emporium. Check him out on Facebook.

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m21GafIYlvA

There is quite a bit to unpack with this, the second entry from HAB sauces I've had, and I'm not sure I'm up to the task. This is, I will note, a distinct positive. Let's start with the name, which is a reference to this sauce in relation to other Habanero-Mango sauces, and I will dissent on this a best, for reasons we'll get into a bit later. The label features this amazing anime-styled art with a couple of females, one is what looks like an angel on one side and the other side with half of the top of her head missing, like someone took a melon baller to it or something. I don't know what to make of this, exactly, or what relation it has to the sauce, but the artist is incredibly talented.

As for the rest, let's get into that. Again, all the fanciness on the outside of the bottle doesn't matter if the inside isn't any good and this one definitely is not only good, but, dare I say, inspired. Here's the thing: when you're deciding to make a very established sauce type, you can go either one of two ways. You can either do what everyone else has already done and try to make it either better, or close to, what others on that path have done or you can throw it all out and go for something entirely unique. They here have chosen the latter.

We have Bulgarian Carrot Peppers, which I have not ever come across before, along with Habaneros, the mangos, some citrus notes, a healthy amount of apple, and one of the better uses of banana I've had in a hot sauce. This results in one of the most fantastic taste experiences, albeit on the sour side, of a sauce I think I've yet had, which strikes me as remarkable, considering the increasingly hefty list just on this blog (I had quite a few before starting this, of course). The balance of flavors, while also allowing the main ones to get in with their own flavor notes, borders on magical and despite this being a sour sauce, I like it quite a lot. 

Given that it is sour, however, that does dial down the flexibility for me, as well as taking this right out of the running, in terms of "murderizing" the competition of the upper echelon of this type of sauce (which I've discussed somewhat in the Gindo's Mango Habanero, my pick for the best of the lot, review, which is elsewhere here). Heat is also decidedly minimum. It is a strong 1 for sure, but never really builds much beyond that. I find this approach an absolute marvel and if you're a fan of sour sauces or of tropical fruit-based sweet hots, this one should be a must on your list.

Bottom line: An experiment that almost shouldn't work with me, given both the sour direction, and the inclusion of bananas, but yet not only does it, it is a near-breathtaking experience. Very impressive showing. 

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 6

Merf's Peaches & Scream Hot Sauce Review

Merf's Peaches & Scream

Note: This sauce was provided for purposes of review by Roger Damptz of Burn Your Tongue, ace hot sauce purveyor. Check him out on Facebook. 

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAUur8o7h4Q

This is a kind of odd coincidence, in that this is the second sauce to not only use the play of words of "peaches and cream," but the second I've done this year, the other being from Ginger Goat, reviewed elsewhere here. And both of them sort of call to mind the question of what's in a name. When I hear a word in the name of a sauce, there are certain expectations. If that word is peaches, I anticipate that flavor. Now, the overall tone may be different, ranging from the aforementioned Ginger Goat, to the absolute best of that type, the Eddie Ojeda peach sauce, which tastes like about the very best peach pie or cobbler you're ever likely to have in this life, but the idea is if you put an ingredient in the name of a sauce, it should be represented, probably heavily, in the flavor profile.

This one, however, seems to dispense with that reasoning. There are many flavors present here, most of them fairly undertoned, but peach is generally not among them. Given that it is, at best, a fairly light flavor and in the ingredient list, it falls behind several other stronger tastes, no real surprise there. This is not the only bit of oddness to this sauce. Generally, when we see sweet-hots, particularly fruit-based ones, they tend to be on the thicker side of things, all the better to hold to stuff, especially when they're also meant to be a dessert sauce. This absolutely will not work there, but it is also quite watery and runny, nearly the equal of your favorite Louisiana-style.

I somewhat question the ingredient label, to a degree, in that the Reaper is the very last ingredient on the panel, but this is quite a fiery sauce, as in chilehead-only territory, well beyond most Habanero sauces (that ingredient is around where peaches is). We also have both carrots and mangos, not to mention vinegar, the flavor profile of all of which show up to a fashion, but are not mentioned in the sauce name. I think part of the issue here is that it's very unclear what this sauce is meant to be. The runniness precludes it from a number of areas it might normally go, and the flavor profile knocks that number down further. What is really curious is that if you use it on breaded foods, which is usually a safe bet for runnier sauces, as it gives something to absorb into, the flavor sort of vanishes and you get this weird effect of the vinegar cutting down somewhat the richness, while leaving a heat charge behind. It's one of those sauces where I have to find places for it to fit and I think this definitely works to disadvantage here. 

Bottom line: A rather unique sauce, best reserved for chileheads, and one that does not really have an obvious natural fit, with a the profile and looseness of the sauce working against it somewhat.

Breakdown:

           Heat level: 3
           Flavor: 6
           Flexibility: 3
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 5

Overall: 4

HAB Pineapple Habanero Hot Sauce Review

HAB Pineapple Habanero 

Note: This sauce was provided for purposes of review by Roger Damptz, of Burn Your Tongue, esteemed hot sauce emporium. Check him out on Facebook.

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

HAB is a sauce company I only recently came across and I find their approach to labels to be pretty admirable, at least on the artwork side. The name of the company, as one might expect, is derived from the venerable Habanero, which appears, if memory serves, in every one of their sauces. All the fancy artwork in the world plastered on the outside of the bottle is great, but it's what inside that matters, of course.

Here, we have a very solid, very steady approach to the Pineapple-Habanero hot sauce, in which we have a strong lean on the pineapple puree side of things. In addition to making it a touch pulpy, it also requires some degree of agitation or else you'll wind up with I did in the early part of the bottle, which was a fairly heavily intensive lime flavor, which I didn't think worked at all well. Fortunately, the flavors settled in as I got further along in the bottle enough to agitate it and we have a ultimately a pretty nice approach.

With only the Habanero, this won't be burning anyone's face to cinders, but the combination of garlic with the pineapple and the soft heat of the Habanero sets this one apart a bit. The salt is used quite effectively and judiciously as well and for this style of sauce, this probably borders on about the best it is ever going to be. Now, for my preference, I would have preferred a bit more sweet to the pineapple and I wish it was a tad less loose, but those are minor quibbles. In every application I would normally enjoy this kind of sauce, it was pretty wonderful and one advantage to using that sort of puree style is that it will work extremely well with grilled meats, up to and including burgers, so nice bonus there.

Bottom line: I got a few, but this is my first introduction to HAB and so far so good. While this sauce isn't a dazzler, what it does very well and if you need an introduction to this style, this is a very good starting point.

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 6

Gindo's Mango Habanero Hot Sauce Review

Gindo's Mango Habanero

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGFBxFUH-Z4

Note: This sauce is courtesy for purposes of review from Roger Damptz of Burn Your Tongue, legendary hot sauce emporium. Check him out on Facebook. 

I don't have a lot of hot sauce companies where any entry from them, in a given year, is automatically going to be a danger of being in contention for Sauce Of The Year, but Gindo's is definitely one of them. Their approach to sauces is, I think, near unrivaled and the output speaks for itself. We have always delicious, high quality bottled results, which do a great job of letting the ingredients shine, will also having its own composite identity. Sometimes that identity works better than other times, to be sure, just the way it goes with these things, but any sauce from Gindo's that I'm having for the first time in a given year is one I tend to view with great anticipation.

It has been a bit since I've had one...I think I wound up skipping them in 2023, due mainly to their model of how they like to go to market, but I was excited to see this one. I surely do love me some fruit-based sweet-hots for a sauces and despite having a lot of Habanero-mango sauces, which are nearly always a mixed bag, I felt a lot safer with my taste buds in those capable hands...that sounded kind of odd, but I do trust Gindo's to deliver, particularly in flavor, and that is always the most important consideration. Indeed, if there was one sauce maker I would point to for those non-chileheads who say hot sauce never tastes good, it would be Gindo's.

So, I do not say this lightly, but this is probably the best Habanero-mango sauce I've ever had. Happily, this one veers toward the sweet side of the fruit and pairing it with some nice yellow and red bell peppers allows those to shine also, as well as drawing in a bit of the fruitiness of the Habanero. Pink Himalayan salt shows up in the mix, which is always a brilliant touch in a sauce, and what we have here is just an incredibly delicious concoction. Given that it's a Habanero sauce, heat was never going to be particularly high and it definitely isn't here, which should make this readily accessible to non-chileheads as well. 

Bottom line:

Gindo's is a sauce company every chilehead should know about and experience and once again, the company delivers the goods here, checking in with my pick for the top of the heap for Mango Habanero sauces. 

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 7

Hellicious Classique Hot Sauce Review

Hellicious Classique

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

This is, if memory serves, my very first review of a sauce hailing from France and I was going to start this off by saying leave it to the land of the heart of cuisine to show everyone how an established hot sauce style should be done, but that would be overstating it quite substantially. While what we have here is very flavorful, vibrant and lively, as well as quite delicious, and certainly it would be in the upper echelon of this style, the formerly hot trend of Habanero-carrot, I find the attempt to gussy it up a bit also tends to limit the flexibility somewhat.

So, let's start with the good parts. I love, as in absolutely adore, the aesthetics of this bottle, from the simulated metal embossed label with the sauce maker's name and logo, to the minimalist approach of the label, while leaving enough room on the surface of the bottle to get a good look at the gorgeous color of the sauce itself, to the bottle, which is definitely a throwback with its very heavy and solid glass bottom, even to the nifty metal cap. Also, I find the flavors of this sauce really emphasize that of the ingredients as vegetables. You get quite a sense of the carrot and the Habanero, as well as an ingredient I don't run across much in general and don't know if I've ever had in a sauce, the Habanada. 

For all of those good, though, there are some not as good. The cap is pretty flexible and seems like it would deform easily. The bottle is listed as 100ml, which is a bit over 3 fluid ounces or 3/5 of what the "normal" hot sauce bottle is here...and then we need to talk about the contents, the sauce.

As to the sauce itself, there is precious little heat here. As it is Habanero, it can build a bit, it just never does to any great extent. Heat is clearly not the goal with this one and it makes a one, but only just, as in barely. Further, there is a tendency of this sauce to want to be the main star and indeed, if your usage is with a focus on this sauce, it's fine. Add it to anything slightly complex, and we get the cancellation effect, which has the negative tendency to really bring out the floral and perfumy aspects of this sauce, which I personally find none too enjoyable. I found this to be best when I used it with relatively unadorned meat and didn't really love it anywhere else, even though I will note this sauce is quite good-tasting solo. For a style that was meant to be an "everyday" sauce, this falls more than a bit flat there.

Bottom line: Ultimately, this is a very interesting and unique take, a spin, as it were, on an established sauce style I don't see a lot of people doing lately. Where you use this, along with how much you enjoy a floral nature to your hot sauce, will greatly influence how much you enjoy this. 

Breakdown:

           Heat level: 1
           Flavor: 6
           Flexibility: 2
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 7

Overall: 4