Hella Hot Carrot & Apple Hot Sauce Review

Hella Hot Carrot & Apple Hot Sauce

UPDATE: Support video now available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7kq6nP82lLY

This brand is evidently taking a stab at literalism, as most of their sauces seem to be fairly literally named for the main ingredients, along with the black and white pastiche of what is evidently the shop owner/founder on the label. All good, don't really care about naming conventions or labels a great deal, unless they're spectacular. These aren't, no big, if the sauce inside is awesome, but I will mention that I think it's a great idea that they post recipes and suggestions utilizing the sauces on the website. That is a pretty simple, yet brilliant, touch.

Getting to that sauce, this is one is a very definitely orangish hue, though perhaps on the lighter side of that scale. It looks a lot like what you might get if you pureed jalapenos, though there are none in this particular sauce, just apple (not specified as to which and the flavor is pretty much non-existent for that component, so no telling by that), carrot, lots and lots of carrot, Habanero and Serrano, which is an interesting combination that I don't recall seeing used before, but which makes a lot of sense.

I've had a fair number of carrot/Habanero sauces, but this is nothing like them. This tastes like nothing so much as super-finely shredded carrots, with the Habanero and Serrano notes. There are other spice notes in there as well, but specificity in ingredients is evidently not a weighty point to the company and so I'm not sure what they are. It tastes more like carrot than anything else, though, to the point where I almost wanted to make a carrot cake with it, just to see...

The sauce is very thick and a bit choppy, as a puree would also tend to be. This does allow it to be used by way of padding it on meat during grilling, for instance, but it works less well by itself as a dipping sauce. I found it somewhat of a novel concept, as I can't think of another sauce I've had like it, but ultimately, I'm not a huge fan of carrots, not enough to be overly fond of this sauce.

Bottom line: An interesting idea, but one that I'm not ultimately sure is successful. I will finish out the bottle, but will not be keeping it in rotation.

Breakdown:

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

Overall: 3