Sauce(s) Of The Year(s) Commentary

Sauce(s) Of The Year Commentary

I’ve been wanting to do this for a while, both to celebrate National Hot Sauce Day, which I don’t think I’ve ever done before on this blog, and with 2025 having the most candidates of any previous year, at least to my memory, I figured now was a good time. That’s the thing, memory. Possibly there were other years with 5, like 2025 [ed note: there were, 2020, 2021 had 6, 2022 had 8. -DW]. I remember 4 being the previous high, but there are hundreds of posts and thousands of words. Perhaps there is someone out there who could remember them all, but not I. 

What has been on the SOTY page has been the winners, but all of those others in contention were excellent sauces in their own right and a lot of it came down to a very subjective personal preference on my part. I make no apologies for this, if someone is going to be the tie-breaker, it probably should be the architect of this blog, who experienced the sauces before and after the written review prior to fall 2019, and then before the written review, during the FOH video, and after the written review, but for any of those other contenders, had I first encountered those sauces in another year, it may be them who were the winners. They deserved more due.

The basis of SOTY has never been the year the sauce came out, as sauce makers themselves do not seem to generally spend a lot of time tracking that, but rather when I first published a written review of it. So, if I had a sauce in late December, but didn’t have a review formulated until January or February of the following year, that sauce would go into contention when the review went live on this blog, even if I had opened the sauce and first tasted it in the previous year. I felt doing it this way was the only fair way to make an equal playing field for the sauces...and also I didn’t feel like trying to track down when a sauce might have first been to market and if it was reformulated, etc. etc.

Anyway, with that in mind, this post, like the list of my personal favorite hot sauce makers and personal favorite pods, will be updated as necessary. I was going to make some extended commentary on the given years, but have considered this will be redundant, given that I generally already do that in my End Of The Year posts for a given year. So instead, I will just add some light context, then list all the sauces in consideration for a given year, with the Sauce Of The Year being signified. If you are interested in why I made the choices I did, that is covered in the End Of The Year posts I mentioned, always coming on the last day of a given year. The count will be for full reviews only, since the mini-review sauces are not eligible for Sauce Of The Year. Of course, any of these sauces named out below are outstanding and if you’re looking for a great new sauce, this is hopefully a great resource...at least for the ones still available and not reformulated.

2012: This was the year I started the blog, however, it came late in the year, with the first post on September 11, 2012. It was not until a few days later, September 15, came the first full review, which was for the long gone Jim Beam hot sauce, though there were a number of mini-reviews prior. This shortened year had 21 posts total, which saw 12 sauces covered in full review. Here are the candidates:

CaJohn’s Bourbon-Infused Chipotle Habanero (BICH)

CaJohn’s Happy Beaver

El Yucateco Habanero Green

2013: The first full year, which saw 52 posts total, 48 of these were for hot sauces and the first-ever double review for the blog. Here is the sole candidate:

Blair’s Pure Death

2014: This year saw 21 posts, which covered 17 sauces. There was also only one candidate that year, a sauce that has since been reformulated:

Born To Hula Ghost Of Ancho

2015: This year saw 32 posts, which covered 26 hot sauces. Here are the candidates:

Tortuga Caribbean Hell-Fire
Voodoo Chile Voo Dew Honey Doo

2016: Another of the lower posting years, with 19 posts on the year, covering 15 sauces. Here are the candidates:

Boar’s Head Jalapeno
Pirate O’s Surface Of The Sun

2017: This year was 23 posts, with 18 sauces covered. Here are the candidates:

Torchbearer The Rapture
Z’s Shield Maiden

2018: The lowest total for any of the years, with 15 posts on the year, covering 12 sauces. Here are the candidates:

Dave’s Scorpion Pepper
Taco Jesus Cayenne

2019: This would have been the lowest year of all and was the year the blog was in jeopardy of me pulling the plug entirely.  Had it not been for the very timely intervention of Roger Damptz of Burn Your Tongue, which also kicked off the FOH video series on YouTube, it very well could have been curtains. Up until then, which was September, there were 7 posts total, with the first not coming until May! After that good swift kick in the ass up, it finished with 20 posts on the year, covering 16 sauces. Here is the sole candidate:

Torchbearer Ultimate Annihilation

2020: Here is when business, as they say, started to pick up. 50 posts on the year, with 45 sauces covered. Here are the candidates, which is the highest total of any year so far:

Arthur Wayne Huckleberry Ghost
Arthur Wayne Limitless
Mikey V’s Sweet Ghost Pepper
Monroy’s Death By Kraken 
Private Selection Calabrian Chile 
Tonguespank Scotch Whiskey Trinidad Scorpion 

2021: This year ran past the previous highest post total year, with 60 posts on the year, covering 56 sauces, and tied the previous high for 6 candidates. Here are the candidates:

Big Red’s 3 Kings
Big Red’s God’s Wrath
CaJohn’s Reaper Sling Blade
Gindo’s Honey Habanero
Gindo’s Original
Silk City Badass Jew

2022: The previous high for posting on the year would be short-lived as this was the year that blew that out of the water, with 95 posts on the year, which remains the current highest-total. This covered 87 sauces. It was also the highest year total for SOTY candidates with 8. Here are the candidates:

Burns & McCoy’s Exhorresco
Hank’s Heat
Hank’s The Linger
Hatari Acid Rain Ghost
Hellfire Hellboy Legendary AF
Silk City Erotic Fever
Silk City Pull Over
Tonguespank Rye Whisky Reaper

2023: This was the year which started the trend of 84 posts on the year, as it has been since this point. This year covered 78 sauces. Here are the candidates:

Canal Street Louisiana Crude
Prescribed Burn’s High Pulp
Puckerbutt’s Chipotle Express
Retsuko Rage [FYE Exclusive]

2024: Again, 84 posts on the year, with 85 sauces covered, including the blog’s first ever triple review and the first-ever quad review. This is the only year where full reviews of sauces exceeds the actual overall blog posting total. Here are the candidates: 

Karma Ashes 2 Ashes
Silk City Shake & Pour Over
Two Heads Music City Heat

2025: Once more with 84...posts on the year, that is, with 81 sauces covered. Here are the candidates:

Adoboloco Jalapeno Chico
Barnacle Foods Habanero
Butterfly Bakery Vienna Mustard Lager
Volcanic Peppers Autumn Blaze
Walkerswood Fire Stick

And that brings us up to date. Looking back while compiling all of this has been a fascinating journey, both with how the blog and how I’ve reviewed has changed over the years. I also found it interesting that so many of the sauces listed above now live in antiquity only and are not generally, if at all, available.  In any event, thanks to everyone who has come with me on these travels, whether you’ve been here for a while or are just now joining.