Gindo's Bacon Bourbon Ghost Hot Sauce Review

Gindo’s Bacon Bourbon Ghost 

I opened the bottle up and a strange thing happened. I went in expecting some smoky notes, which is typical of most bacon sauces, but there was none to be had here. At the time, I kind of shrugged and went on into my sampling and testing process for the sauce and largely forgot about that part...all the way up until I shot the video for it. Not quite sure what happened, but there are neither bacony notes nor bacon at all in this sauce, nor is it listed in the ingredient list, so understanding the name eludes me a tad.

For all that, it is a quite flavorful sauce. There are yellow and red Bell, Cayenne, Habanero, and Ghosties all in the mix, with the Ghosties providing the slight bitter superhot notes and the fairly moderate heat that is here and with everything providing a nice flavor base. This is another very pepper-forward sauce, which I quite enjoy, and as I got further into the bottle, I started to get some of the tropical pepper vibes, a fruity aspect without it being particularly sweet, which I attribute to the Habaneros in Gindo’s skilled hands.

I do admit to some misgivings with this sauce, as I have not had too many bacon sauces I’ve loved or even enjoyed a great deal and booze in sauces I find more of a minefield than an ingredient especially enjoyable, but I trusted Gindo’s with the latter of those two and was very curious to see what they would do with the bacon as an ingredient. My curiousity will have to remain unsatisfied in that regard, at least for now, it would seem.

This is still a lovely concoction, a very bright, lively, and wonderfully vibrant sauce. There are a number of suggestions on the label, many of which I could see, but some, such as the breakfast sandwiches, I’m a lot less certain about. I half wonder if they were made with the idea that this sauce would have some intense bacon smokiness to it, which would meld pretty well with all of the things mentioned. I do appreciate that they’re there, even if I found these slightly off-kilter comparatively. For me, I didn’t want to tread on this sauce, but rather use it in settings where it could shine, so things like chicken and fish and lighter flavors generally seemed to work well. I strongly feel this could also work spectacularly on a nice sub sandwich, which I also think is one of the more underrated applications for hot sauces generally.

Bottom line: I definitely would like to try the version of this that actually has bacon, but for what’s here, I find this another flavor marvel from Gindo’s, though perhaps not quite up to the highest levels of some of the other sauces. Absolutely worth a go if you love the flavor of pods.

Breakdown:

            Heat level: 1
            Flavor: 8
            Flexibility: 6
            Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8

Overall: 6