Radiation Therapy Prototype C Hot Sauce Review

Radiation Therapy Prototype C

I have asked this question, aloud, rhetorically, into the thin air, before, of course, namely that which is if a sauce is not hot, regardless of which chiles are in it, can it verily be rightfully called a hot sauce? I suppose the answer varies by person and I'm not moving from my position of leaving it up to the sauce makers to determine if they intend on making a hot sauce or not and then reflecting that on the label, but this is another that raises that question. This, while pretty tasty overall, is very much an exceedingly mild sauce, to the point where I cannot give it a numerical value at all on the heat scale. 

Radiation Therapy is a newer company and this perhaps a relatively new sauce, as the batch number on this is in the low single digits. The label mentions chipotle prominently and that is definitely one of the more forward tastes here, but on the ingredient panel itself are many ingredients, but none of them are chipotle. I also strongly question the ordering of the ingredients on the label. The first one is orange, but there is little citrus here generally and I can't say I found the flavor of orange to be present at all. Certainly one would expect a lot more for a sauce with that as the first ingredient. There are a few other chiles as well, including Morita, Cayenne, and Ancho. At times, this sauce reminded me a bit of the old Ghost Of Ancho from Born To Hula (reviewed elsewhere here), which was my SOTY once upon a when (full list at right). 

While the label copy is suggestive of the idea that the company really meant for this to be an everyday "table" sauce, it's hard to see, given all the ingredients, which point pretty strongly to a Mexican-style or Southwestern sauce, that this would work out especially well. In addition to the Chipotle, which I could have actually used more of, there are old staples of onion (powder), garlic, cumin, and honey as well, though the honey again doesn't really show up as a flavor and of those others, garlic is by far the most prominent, though only as an accent. 

I did kick this around on a number of other foods, but definitely Mexican-style food is by far the best application here. It's not awful, per se, on things like chicken and pizza, but I definitely wanted something else. On Mexican food, it pairs very well with complex stuff like tacos, carne asada or shrimp or fish (not so much chicken or pork), but also in more stripped down foods, such as refrieds. I think it they marketed it more in that direction and ramped up the chipotle more, maybe added in some fire-roasted Habaneros, they'd have a pretty solid winner on their hands. As it is, this is more just a solid and somewhat promising entry.

Bottom line: Not quite ready for prime time, this one is more a sauce reflecting promise for the maker in the future rather than being an outright good sauce. 

Breakdown:

           Heat level: 0
           Flavor: 7
           Flexibility: 3
           Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6

Overall: 4