Irish Spike's Black & Gold Hot Sauce Review

Irish Spike's Black & Gold 

The last of the run of what I had hoped would be mislabeled mustards being called hot sauces and it is by far the busiest of them. The entire attempt was ultimately a bust, as they all turned out to be more hot sauce than mustard by a fair bit, including this one. This one is sort of a cross between a mustard and an Italian seasonings dried spice jar and while it is portrayed as being fit for burgers, hot dogs, and sausages, I must dissent to that idea.

What we have here is a sort of kitchen sink approach, with the number of ingredients approaching 20. This is not necessarily bad, however, as mentioned, both mustard and Italian type seasonings tend to be very strong and, unfortunately here, somewhat clashy. This is also a very chunky, rather textured sauce, with various bits and pieces of different items. This bothers me less, other than clearly some of the stuff was dry when added and that stuff didn’t seem to hydrate fully enough to prevent it from being jammed in my teeth.

The main heat here is from Cayenne, which is quite moderate, to be sure. This is the first sauce I’ve had from Irish Spike’s, though I’ve had them on the radar for a bit, and while I’m not overly impressed, I am very curious as to other entries in their lineup. For this one, though, I just don’t find it works particularly well, as you can try to pair to a mustard or pair to Italian flavorings, but you can’t really do both at once. This works ok on chicken tendies, but I can’t say I really enjoyed it much beyond those and I’d rather have had something different there also.

Bottom line: The first sauce in quite some time where I’ve done a full review and there is some question as to whether or not I’m going to finish out the bottle [editor's note - no], though I don’t find the flavor bad so much as more confusing than anything.

 
Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 3
            Flexibility: 1
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 2

Overall: 2