Ginger Goat Peaches N Scream
Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_uR0vApe-nU
I've seen these on the hallowed shelves of BYT for quite some time and have taken a gander at them a time or two, but nothing ever quite clicked for me to actually get a bottle. Either the ingredients didn't strike me as enticing at the time or had onions, but for whatever reason, despite them having a readily recognizable logo (though they need to get rid of the light orange bar behind the sauce names), I just made a note of them for some time in the future and found other stuff more exciting.
For a lot of this year, my "hit" list, that is the running list of the sauces that I want to try, has been running way shorter than normal, which turns out a great problem to have as I could finally get to a number of those backbenchers. And happily, as with a few other sauces this year, I've found an absolute delight I didn't know I was missing, with this, my introductory sauce to Ginger Goat and, as they say, an absolute banger right out of the gate.
Truth be told, I think part of my interest in this particular sauce over other entries in their lineup was due to the fact that it had peaches in the name and one of my further back-of-the-brain ideas for the blog was to try to have coverage on every peach hot sauce I could manage that didn't have any banned or undesirable ingredients. Interestingly enough, this particular sauce, despite having peaches as the first ingredient, has very minimal peach flavor and when it does show up, it's more of a grace note. This is definitely more of a sauce in which the whole is greater than the sum of the parts.
A lot of the lighter and brighter elements come more to the fore. Fresh ginger is definitely strong on the nose of this sauce, though not so much in the flavor. Carrots give it body, but don't come across as a dominant flavor, either. The apple cider vinegar and maple syrup are represented more generally in terms of astringency and sweetness. I'm not familiar enough with Chocolate Scorpions to comment too much on where they play in to the flavor, other than to note that, thankfully, there is little to no floral aspect to this sauce. This one is definitely edging more into chilehead only territory, but isn't quite there, to my mind.
Instead, what we have here is a fairly delicate balance of many things at once, all in this rather rich depth and creaminess provided by the olive oil. Basil is definitely one factor, but there are a few other spice elements here as well, beyond the aforementioned (or the garlic, yet another listed component). I'm guessing possibly a curry and maybe a cumin, as well as probably a few others I can't quite pick out. As with most sauces that have oils in them, the flavor changes a bit as you work through the bottle, but it has never been anything less than a delight.
This is a sauce that does extremely well in non-rich settings, so the lighter meats, as a salad dressing, over rice as well. I had quite a lovely time using this on some shawarma, which is where I think it does exceedingly well. It's fine on chicken strips also, but, again thanks to the oil, this sauce is much better warmed slightly than cold, so if you can put it in that setting, it definitely comes across much better.
Bottom line: Very impressive introduction to me for Ginger Goat and this sauce is nothing short of a marvel, though, I daresay the more food adventurous you are, the better for this one.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 2
Flavor: 10
Flexibility: 5
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10
Overall: 7
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