Butterfly Bakery Taco Vibes Only Hot Sauce Review

Butterfly Bakery Taco Vibes Only

Note: This sauce appeared in Season 20 of The Hot Ones.

Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMMF2dJoiGY

I don’t typically start reviews like this, but I will say upfront and directly that this is a chilehead only sauce. It comes roaring out of the gate, with a burst of heat followed by the lively and vibrant Reaper tones and, since that is a building pepper, which has both the pods and powder representing things here, only builds from there. There is certainly an attempt at flavor, much more than a half-hearted stab and indeed, red Serranos, which are wonderful, are the first chile, but they too fall more than a bit under the blistering blaze of the Reaper. As if that were not enough, Ghosties are also in the mix, presumably to help the Reapers a bit and to dull the edge of the superhot bitterness, but there is no getting around it, even if that tamping down does achieve a very nice effect overall, in terms of flavor.

There is a host of other flavors, lime, coriander, garlic, cumin, but none of them really read particularly strongly, aside from subtle aftertaste notes here and there, hence the name, one supposes. This is much more a very chile forward sauce and I liken it more to perhaps a Cajun or Louisiana style, at least in terms of usage. It does have a good solid vinegar hit as well, so for me, it doesn’t work particularly well on tacos, for instance, and while I thought it was interesting on pizza, which, given its sort of medium thickness, I thought I’d attempt, it was a touch overly vinegary there as well. I didn’t dislike it, by any means, but would rather other sauces for that. If you stick to the applications where you might reach for a Cajun or Lousiana-style, you’ll probably be fine, so long as you are a chilehead and moreso if you also like the flavor of Reapers.

I will also note this has a quite appetizing color as well, a very lovely reddish sort of orange. There are some bits of grit in here, definitely from seeds, but possibly also pod skin, which I didn’t find enjoyable, but those only come up here and there.

Bottom line: I’m not entirely sure what they meant for this sauce in terms of flavor, but it is very Reaper intensive. Further, while it’s not quite a mouth full of blast furnace out the gate, it definitely packs a decisive wallop.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 3
            Flavor: 7
            Flexibility: 6
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8

Overall: 6