Puckerbutt Smokin’ Ed’s Peach Super Hot Blend
Dear reader, I was wrong. Indeed, when I first opened this sauce, and caught the distinctive aroma of superhots, I figured I had pegged this correctly (I’m generally pretty astute at this type of thing, if I do say so myself), but when I splashed, or rather tried to splash - the nature of this sauce caused it to run along the threads and neck of the bottle here and there first, some of this even onto the food - it because very clear there was something wrong with this sauce. It took me a while to understand why, but I finally get it now. It’s because this is not really a hot sauce.
So, a brief digression as we take a look at the bare minimums for something to be a hot sauce. We can look again to Louisiana-style for this and those sauces are mostly composed of chiles, usually Cayenne, vinegar, and salt. Sometimes they will add water and xanthan gum as well, but as often not, and they are very clearly hot sauces, both in name and intention. So, let’s extend this mental exercise a bit. If you remove one of those three basic ingredients, you get the following: salted chiles, salted vinegar, chile vinegar.
It is the last option above where I think this product most aptly fits, as there is no salt in it. Salt is so ubiquitous and so usual and mainstream to our palates that take it away and it is immediately apparently that something is wrong, but in the world of hot sauces, where the sauce is meant to go with something else, it is not always immediately apparent what that is.
So, I am faced, once more, with the conundrum of how do I grade something that is not a hot sauce by hot sauce criteria, which is a bit, I suppose, like grading a dog or cat based on a human IQ test. Yet, the label very clearly says “hot sauce,” and I make it a point to take the makers at their words, so the scoring will be done as if this was a hot sauce, though I will add it not is not reflective necessarily of my impressions. I don’t really use vinegar and don’t really keep it on hand and when I do, it is always in a recipe of some kind. I do not just use it as a condiment on finished foods and can’t imagine anyone pouring vinegar on fried chicken or pizza (I know the Brits do it with fried fish, but I find that practice weird and icky and do not enjoy that).
So, following those lines, flexibility is non-existent, in terms of hot sauce, flavor is ok (again, as a vinegar), and as a hot sauce is fairly low as well because this is far too vinegar-forward.. Heat-wise, we have a nondescript super hot blend, which, according to Puckerbutt, ranges from Peach Ghosties to Peach Reapers. Fine, fair enough, this is definitely chilehead only territory.
Bottom line: This is not really a hot sauce, but a superhot chile-flavored vinegar, scorching enough to be reserved for chileheads.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 3
Flavor: 2
Flexibility: 1
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 3
Overall: 2
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