AR's Peach Hot Sauce Review

AR's Hot Southern Honey Peach Hot Sauce

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

Whilst looking around for stuff to acquire for the FOH video series on the non-sauce content, I was casting about for either spicy peanut butters or spicy honeys. AR's Hot Southern Honey had both, as well as a hot sauce. Given that it had both honey and Habanero, as well as peach, and none of my banned ingredients, I couldn't resist and picked it up. It sat on one of my on-deck shelves for a while until I ran out of one of the sweeter sauces I had at hand (along with Louisiana-style, I always try to keep some sweet-hot around) and I ran across this. 

Much like the peanut butter from them (have not tried the honey, as of yet, so that is forthcoming), I have found the actual product to be a bit underwhelming. It starts with peach, then Habanero, then honey, so really off to a great start. Had they maybe added a touch of salt and vinegar to round things out, we'd be about set. From there, we see the addition of ginger (not bad, adds some freshness, liveliness, and lightness to the flavor) and we're still ok. Once the coriander and turmeric roll in, though, it gets decidedly less ok. The rest of the stuff, vinegar, water, garlic, lemon, don't really impact things as much as the two spices do and for me, the impact is negative.

This is a very refined sauce, very smooth, very processed, with some of the dry spices evident in the tone of the sauce. I can honestly say I would never have expected the addition of those two spices or this particular combination and it's largely because dry spices of that type can easily overpower things. Here, we have a very slight peach taste, no heat or flavor from the Habaneros, and the honey reads more as a general sweetness. I will say it is a unique sauce and I've had nothing like it, but it is not one I find particularly pleasant. It's not unpalatable or anything, but isn't especially enjoyable either.

Bottom line: Somewhat of a confusing entry, with a preponderance of dry spices and a sort of vaguely peach-flavored slightly sweet base leading to something that might be good in baking or as an additional ingredient in a mixed drink, possibly, but does not function well as an actual hot sauce.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 0
            Flavor: 3
            Flexibility: 2
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 0

Overall: 1