Bravado Black Garlic Carolina Reaper Hot Sauce Review

Bravado Black Garlic Carolina Reaper Hot Sauce

Note: This sauce appears on Season 6 of The Hot Ones.

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6ik9EORHeY

I have not held a particularly great appreciation for anything Bravado makes generally. In fact, this was pretty far down on the list of things (full description of the order can be found in the SOTY Q4 2021 post, if interested) for coverage of The Hot Ones show. The sauces (full list available to the light) on that show I find to be a really mixed bag in that they mostly are treading the middle quite extensively. It is few and far between that I find entries I really enjoy to the extend of considering buying them again. 

So that it was as good as it is came as no small surprise to me, given my expectations were not high, not the least of which because I had found many of the sauces with the Carolina Reaper to be somewhat uneven. The ingredient of black garlic is also a sort of trendy foodie item, as far as I'm concerned, and the subtlety of it often leads it to not reading at all in the respective flavor profiles. 

Once I got into this, though, I found a phenomenal richness to the pepper flavor, helped amply, no doubt, by the red Serranos also here, which also contributes to the beautiful red color of the sauce.. Like all of the Bravado line, this is a very smooth sauce. All of the elements blend together quite well to make a whole, a composite, that goes a long way towards demonstrating the capacity of that black garlic. The Reaper here is used mostly for a heat element, I suppose, and not so much for flavor, but there is a very slight sweetness from both it and from the maple syrup, though the flavor of both that and the black pepper do not really register. This is another sauce that will change its complexion notably, depending on where it's used.

For me, I really feel that the best thing to do with a sauce that is meaning to emphasize a umami flavor element is to use it on a food that itself has a high umami aspect. This meant I used it on such things as my signature breakfast burritos, as a dipping sauce, and perhaps my favorite application, in some nice ramen. The sauce is flexible enough that it does well in a fairly wide variety of foods, though the more umami the better, to be sure.

Bottom line: The first entry from a sauce company that I've found to have very slick and well-done labels, only to have the sauce be wanting, that is both highly enjoyable and lives up to the hype of the ingredients. Another of the few from The Hot Ones shows that I feel is a truly excellent sauce.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 4
            Flavor: 9
            Flexibility: 8
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 7

Overall: 7