Palo Alto Firefighters Habanero Pepper Sauce Review

Palo Alto Firefighters Habanero

I can’t remember how I came across this one initially, but I stuck it in a wish list and there it sat for quite a while, just hanging out, waiting... Eventually, I wound up needing another for shipping, though I was looking more for sweet hots at the time, and tossed it in because I’d only initially been curious but had seen it enough times that my idle curiousity was getting a tad more pronounced over time. This is not uncommon for me, as I keep lists of lots of stuff, but the ones that aren’t quite red burning hot will get shuffled to one of the cooler burners in the back, still there, but more just being there until the mood strikes.

Anyway, I didn’t know quite what to expect with this one, other than I expected it to be mild, as the ingredients were fairly non-descript. One of those, “spice,” is doing quite a bit of work and encompasses, at minimum, some cumin, onion powder, and garlic powder, meanwhile paprika is specifically named out. The first two ingredients here are the red Jalapeno, always a great choice, and the Habanero, which is there to be the heat driver, so as a pepper sauce, peppers are fairly forward.. There is a notable degree of tang and tartness from the vinegar, which is a touch strong for my preference, and I could have done with a lot less of the cumin.

What this reads as is a hotter version of the Ortega or La Victoria hot sauce bottles you can see pretty readily on grocery store shelves. For many of us, these were among out first introductions to hot sauce, with a fairly low key and mild flavor, being perhaps akin to liquified taco packet seasoning, which, for better or worse, is around where I would put this. Given the Habanero, it is notably hotter than anything I’ve had from either of those two companies, but also given the Habanero, nothing I consider particularly challenging. Unless I miss my guess, they were definitely aiming more at a table sauce here, but I suppose because my memories are too tied into those foods I mentioned, taco seasoning packet tacos and so on, this seems much more in line with that than with a more universal table sauce. Even down to the color itself strikes me as much more in that vein. 

Bottom line: While a tad too cumin-heavy and vinegar-forward for my personal tastes, this is a very nice smooth, slightly runny, hotter and ultimately higher end taco sauce. 

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 4
            Flexibility: 4
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6

Overall: 4