Puckerbutt Honey Bonnet & Honey Half-Note
Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wffZAVFvH4U
I've written quite a bit about how much I love the combination of honey and Habanero, when done right, as well as how find I am for Scotch Bonnets, so a sauce with honey and Scotch Bonnet together was certainly not one that I'd have much resistance to. It also had cinnamon, which I'm not overly fond of, but far back in the ingredients list, so I figured it probably wouldn't show up too prominently. Then I came across this Honey Half-Note, and initially, I was more interested in the knowledge that Smokin' Ed Currie was (is?) a drummer and that half of the proceeds from this sauce were being donated to a musician's cause for kids. As a hack who has one and off tried to make a stab at doing the "make pretty notes" thing myself, I definitely support this. It is a good thing and I back good things when and where I can, especially when someone goes out of their way to make it as easy (and potentially tasty) as this.
Ok, so the idea here is essentially the Honey Bonnet is as the name would lead you to think, essentially Scotch Bonnet mash (I'm guessing) and honey, with little traces here and there of cinnamon. One can get a really solid feel for the flavor of the Bonnets, with the honey not being as noticeable and perhaps more just there to blunt the edges a bit. Cinnamon, as mentioned, is more along the lines of grace notes only. This one does have a pretty nice heat build and probably will be best enjoyed by a chilehead audience.
Honey Half-Note, meanwhile, is supposed to be a tamer version of the Honey Bonnet, with the heat more or less cut in half. I personally found it to be much less than that. In fact, this is almost a different sauce entirely. Indeed, if you put them side by side, the color difference would paint a fairly stark contrast (look for this in the forthcoming video - linked posted at the top of this review when live). The honey, which was moderate to begin with, vanishes almost entirely, along with a lot of the Scotch Bonnet flavor. Cinnamon touches are nearly entirely absent also. It's almost as if the entire sauce were toned down, sort of the effect of putting a muffler (mute) in the end of a trumpet. Vinegar is a lot more forward in this sauce and it tends a bit towards the sour side. While the flavor is dissimilar to the Honey Bonnet and more uniquely its own, it is still quite nice.
In terms of flexibility, I've found that the more I enjoy a sauce, the more it lends itself to different food types. Even when a sauce doesn't work with a food outright, such as Blair's Pure Death (reviewed elsewhere here), one of my all-time favorites, the sauce will still please my palate enough that I mind less the lack of integration with the flavors of the food. In that respect, it's kind of what we have going on here. With the more astringent nature of the Honey Half-Note, I find that it works better in a setting where I might normally want a Louisiana-style sauce. With the Honey Bonnet, it strikes me as more of a sweet-hot, a style which I find goes with a slightly higher variety of foods.
Although I think this was meant as two sides of the same coin, these two, despite being related, read more as two distinct sauces. Depending on whether your pleasure is more towards sweet heat or astringency, either one of these will naturally be more resonant.
Bottom line: The Honey Bonnet does a very nice job of showcasing the venerable Scotch Bonnet's flavor and heat and might be best reserved for chileheads. The Honey Half-Note is a much tamer-flavored and heat-wise version, albeit with a lot more astringency, supporting a very worthy cause. Both are well worth a shot.
Breakdown:
Honey Bonnet
Heat level: 3
Flavor: 8
Flexibility: 7
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8
Overall: 6
Honey Half-Note
Heat level: 1
Flavor: 5
Flexibility: 5
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6
Overall: 4
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