Saturday, March 29, 2014
Happy Sippin' Companion is live
Just a short note for anyone out there that may be following and cares about this, but due to the demise of the site for which I was doing my wine blog, the Happy Sippin' Companion, I've elected to take it a temporary home here: d-dubhsc.blogspot.com. I'd invite you to go and check it out if you're at all interested in a building a wine list with entries that are available, for the most part, at under $20 a bottle.
Maui Pepper Smokin' Mango Hot Sauce Review
Maui Pepper Co. Smokin' Mango Hot Sauce
This is ostensibly supposed to be a smoked version of the Mango Meltdown (review elsewhere in this blog) from this same company and this is accomplished by adding Chipotle peppers. Now, the problem with doing such a thing is you start with a fairly mild tasting fruit, in this case those aforementioned mangoes and then add in a much stronger tasting substance, that being the Chipotle peppers and you pretty much drown out a lot of the subtleties and nuances of the prior sauce, which is what happens here.
That being said, this is not a bad sauce. Enough remains of both the nice bit of sweetness, a touch of the fruitiness and the lovely back heat of the Habaneros, along with the smokiness and front heat of the Chipotles to create something more than a full-on smoked pepper blast. The Chipotle is unquestionably the dominant flavor, however. Heat level is around the same as the Mango Meltdown and uses are about the same.
Bottom line: Given that I really enjoyed the subtleties and complexities of the earlier sauce, it was kind of a shame to see the Chipotle wrecking ball come in to the extent it does here. With Chipotle, a little goes a long way. This is perhaps over a little...
Breakdown:
Heat level: 3
Flavor: 6
Flexibility: 7
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6
Overall: 6
This is ostensibly supposed to be a smoked version of the Mango Meltdown (review elsewhere in this blog) from this same company and this is accomplished by adding Chipotle peppers. Now, the problem with doing such a thing is you start with a fairly mild tasting fruit, in this case those aforementioned mangoes and then add in a much stronger tasting substance, that being the Chipotle peppers and you pretty much drown out a lot of the subtleties and nuances of the prior sauce, which is what happens here.That being said, this is not a bad sauce. Enough remains of both the nice bit of sweetness, a touch of the fruitiness and the lovely back heat of the Habaneros, along with the smokiness and front heat of the Chipotles to create something more than a full-on smoked pepper blast. The Chipotle is unquestionably the dominant flavor, however. Heat level is around the same as the Mango Meltdown and uses are about the same.
Bottom line: Given that I really enjoyed the subtleties and complexities of the earlier sauce, it was kind of a shame to see the Chipotle wrecking ball come in to the extent it does here. With Chipotle, a little goes a long way. This is perhaps over a little...
Breakdown:
Heat level: 3
Flavor: 6
Flexibility: 7
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 6
Overall: 6
Sunday, March 9, 2014
Bell River Caribbean Hot Sauce Review
Bell River Brand Caribbean Hot Sauce
Bell River appears to be a division of Heartbreaking Dawn. That particular company is probably on the radar of most discriminating chileheads and has been on mine for a while, not least because of its intriguing naming system of using years for the sauce, as well as the descriptive nature of adding descriptors in the form of nicknames, i.e. "Cauterizer", for the different variations. They've made a great name for themselves and they're on my radar, but due to either an unfortunate lust of theirs for using onions in everything or an unfortunate reaction with my own chemistry that reacts negatively and forcefully to onions, I have not seen a product of theirs I've been able to pull the trigger on. With them creating the product line for this entry from Bell River, that has now been rectified.
Using the word "Caribbean" with things lends the mind to a certain direction, which is perhaps best culminated and most renowned in the Jamaican "jerk" seasoning profile, though when I picked this up, I didn't really expect that. It looked in the bottle more like a Louisiana-style sauce to me, just with a lot of other additions. In several respects, that is true. There are at least over 20 listed ingredients to this, including orange and red Habaneros and Datil peppers, though there are probably 10 ingredients that come before the peppers. One might think this would be a not particularly piquant sauce, but one would only be half-right there.
This is certainly no full-throttled SHU rager or anything, but there is plenty there to add a decent amount of punch to things. I also rarely say this, but given the thinness of this sauce, I would have preferred a dropper cap here, as this stuff is definitely right along the lines of Louisiana-style sauce in flavor as well. There are no Cayennes or Tabascos to be found and it doesn't have that nice bit of zing, that tangy harshness that most Louisiana-styles sauces have. Instead, it is a fuller, rounder, smoother, much more complex and slightly sweeter version, which goes a long way towards fulfilling the promise of using the word "Caribbean" as a descriptor. Usage, however, is primarily the same as a Louisiana-style sauce and this works best as a substitute for an existing sauce type, not necessarily a new style all its own.
Bottom line: This is a very tasty sauce and at $5 a bottle, dollar for dollar, one of the best values out there. I don't know that I would use it to replace any of my existing Louisiana-style sauces, particularly if I happen to want a punch in the mouth with my food, but I would definitely not shy away from it, either, inconvenience of no dropper cap aside. I could see myself getting another bottle of this, depending on what else was available.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 4
Flavor: 9
Flexibility: 7
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 9
Overall: 7
Bell River appears to be a division of Heartbreaking Dawn. That particular company is probably on the radar of most discriminating chileheads and has been on mine for a while, not least because of its intriguing naming system of using years for the sauce, as well as the descriptive nature of adding descriptors in the form of nicknames, i.e. "Cauterizer", for the different variations. They've made a great name for themselves and they're on my radar, but due to either an unfortunate lust of theirs for using onions in everything or an unfortunate reaction with my own chemistry that reacts negatively and forcefully to onions, I have not seen a product of theirs I've been able to pull the trigger on. With them creating the product line for this entry from Bell River, that has now been rectified.
Using the word "Caribbean" with things lends the mind to a certain direction, which is perhaps best culminated and most renowned in the Jamaican "jerk" seasoning profile, though when I picked this up, I didn't really expect that. It looked in the bottle more like a Louisiana-style sauce to me, just with a lot of other additions. In several respects, that is true. There are at least over 20 listed ingredients to this, including orange and red Habaneros and Datil peppers, though there are probably 10 ingredients that come before the peppers. One might think this would be a not particularly piquant sauce, but one would only be half-right there.
This is certainly no full-throttled SHU rager or anything, but there is plenty there to add a decent amount of punch to things. I also rarely say this, but given the thinness of this sauce, I would have preferred a dropper cap here, as this stuff is definitely right along the lines of Louisiana-style sauce in flavor as well. There are no Cayennes or Tabascos to be found and it doesn't have that nice bit of zing, that tangy harshness that most Louisiana-styles sauces have. Instead, it is a fuller, rounder, smoother, much more complex and slightly sweeter version, which goes a long way towards fulfilling the promise of using the word "Caribbean" as a descriptor. Usage, however, is primarily the same as a Louisiana-style sauce and this works best as a substitute for an existing sauce type, not necessarily a new style all its own.
Bottom line: This is a very tasty sauce and at $5 a bottle, dollar for dollar, one of the best values out there. I don't know that I would use it to replace any of my existing Louisiana-style sauces, particularly if I happen to want a punch in the mouth with my food, but I would definitely not shy away from it, either, inconvenience of no dropper cap aside. I could see myself getting another bottle of this, depending on what else was available.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 4
Flavor: 9
Flexibility: 7
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 9
Overall: 7
Saturday, March 1, 2014
Maui Pepper Mango Meltdown Hot Sauce Review
Maui Pepper Co. Mango Meltdown Hot Sauce
Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGbDvmRyqlQ
After a prolonged layoff from the fruit-based sauces, I finally came around back to them on the last shopping trip, picking up a 3 pack from the Maui Pepper Company, all of which largely featured Habanero peppers. Habanero and Mango has sounded conceptually like a very winning combination, but the reality repeatedly has been a letdown, to the point where I just gave up. I wasn't really looking at getting back to any of the fruit sauces and considered all of them a wash...until now.
In this, we finally have someone who has figured out what degree of ripeness in which to use the mangos, so we have a solid base that is neither too sweet nor too sour, but right in the hot zone, where it is a perfect combination of them both, maybe even erring a bit on the sweeter side so that when the vinegar is added, it will cut it down nicely to that perfect level. Now, I may be embellishing a bit, as there are additional sweeteners, but whatever the formula, the effect is excellent. This is one of the more well-made sauces out there.
All of that would be nice, but you'd still have a sort of runny jelly were it not for the heat. Now, this isn't packing a ton of heat, by any means, but there is enough back end head to let you know it's there, maybe even a little past that. It is truly a delight, in many ways and though it won't go with everything, it does go with quite a lot. You could almost arguably use this interchangeably with a Louisiana-style sauce, especially on fried foods, for a very nice change of pace.
Bottom line: This is a very well-crafted sauce and probably the first fruit-based sauce I have really liked and enjoyed enough to want to buy again. Definitely if you're a fan of mangoes and Habaneros, this sauce is right up your alley, but for a first foray into fruit-based hot sauces, this is a fantastic starting point as well.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 2
Flavor: 7
Flexibility: 6
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8
Overall: 6
Sunday, February 23, 2014
Irazu Fire-Roasted Habanero & Garlic Hot Sauce Review
Irazu Volcanic Pepper Fire-Roasted Habanero & Garlic Sauce
UPDATE: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2bQWOpIjMc
Habanero and Garlic are one of those interesting combinations of sauces that seems to crop up every now and again, often enough to be familiar but not so prevalent as to quite be its own category. These sauces invariably are best on lighter colored meats, such as chicken or pork and especially seafood and there is a certain similarity among them enough that you know instantly what you're getting into and expect. Having mined that territory thoroughly enough, I wasn't really looking to re-enter it when I picked this up, as Blair's Pure Death covers that nicely enough on its own, but put the words "fire-roasted" in front of something and I'm instantly interested.
For this particular sauce, the Garlic is very apparent upon opening this bottle and is what we would call heavy on the nose. Taste-wise, there is a good blend of that wonderful fire-roasted flavor, along with that of the Habanero and of course, that Garlic, though Habanero is probably the lightest of those flavors. I actually liked the flavor of the fire-roasted Habaneros so much that I now harbor thoughts that Habanero, which is not a flavor I'm especially in love with, should always be fire-roasted.
Despite the fact that this particular sauce is named after an active Costa Rican volcano, the heat here is fairly minimal. It is a very flavorful and tasty sauce, but not particularly hot, definitely not anywhere near what I was anticipating. In a way, this is sort of unfortunate, as it, while no contender for the Ghost Of Ancho currently leading the race for Sauce Of The Year 2014, would be something I would strongly consider keeping on hand and just may anyway.
Bottom line: This is one I'm a bit on the fence about, but the odds are good that when I go back to a hot sauce emporium to re-up, I may wind up leaving with another bottle of this.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 2
Flavor: 8
Flexibility: 6
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8
Overall: 6
UPDATE: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2bQWOpIjMc Habanero and Garlic are one of those interesting combinations of sauces that seems to crop up every now and again, often enough to be familiar but not so prevalent as to quite be its own category. These sauces invariably are best on lighter colored meats, such as chicken or pork and especially seafood and there is a certain similarity among them enough that you know instantly what you're getting into and expect. Having mined that territory thoroughly enough, I wasn't really looking to re-enter it when I picked this up, as Blair's Pure Death covers that nicely enough on its own, but put the words "fire-roasted" in front of something and I'm instantly interested.
For this particular sauce, the Garlic is very apparent upon opening this bottle and is what we would call heavy on the nose. Taste-wise, there is a good blend of that wonderful fire-roasted flavor, along with that of the Habanero and of course, that Garlic, though Habanero is probably the lightest of those flavors. I actually liked the flavor of the fire-roasted Habaneros so much that I now harbor thoughts that Habanero, which is not a flavor I'm especially in love with, should always be fire-roasted.
Despite the fact that this particular sauce is named after an active Costa Rican volcano, the heat here is fairly minimal. It is a very flavorful and tasty sauce, but not particularly hot, definitely not anywhere near what I was anticipating. In a way, this is sort of unfortunate, as it, while no contender for the Ghost Of Ancho currently leading the race for Sauce Of The Year 2014, would be something I would strongly consider keeping on hand and just may anyway.
Bottom line: This is one I'm a bit on the fence about, but the odds are good that when I go back to a hot sauce emporium to re-up, I may wind up leaving with another bottle of this.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 2
Flavor: 8
Flexibility: 6
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 8
Overall: 6
Sunday, February 9, 2014
Arizona Gunslinger Habanero Hot Sauce Review
Arizona Gunslinger Habanero Pepper Sauce
Note: Support video available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_emM7UlTcaE
This particular brand, perhaps because it originates not too far away in Mesa, AZ, seems to show up frequently here and I finally got around to getting a bottle from them. I chose the hottest I could find at the time, which was the Habanero. A couple of pistols and the legend "Smokin' Hot" appear on the label, but frankly, this is more of a Jalapeno sauce than anything. Habanero is listed as the first ingredient, followed closely by Jalapeno, but frankly, salt is the most dominant aspect here. It's a shame, as this sauce had potential. There is little heat in it, but the blend of flavors, if you put it on something, for instance, needing salt, is pretty good. This could be something to keep on hand, but not at the risk of sending one into hypertension.
Aside from that, the company made a very odd decision to put a restrictor cap on a sauce that's fairly thick. I'd put the consistency at approaching ketchup, which is easy to control, but booting that cap becomes a pretty quick necessity. It does seem to do well on a variety of foods, though, again, it does remarkably better on those that are either salt-free or undersalted. It is not quite a table sauce, but a slightly uptick to that and if they dialed down the sauce, might be something I would keep on hand.
Bottom line: This sauce is sort of a shame as it could be one I would consider keeping on hand, as the heat level is low enough for my wife to tolerate and it does strike me as otherwise being a good sauce for Mexican-type foods. Still, I prefer my seasonings to be more separate (i.e. hot sauce as hot sauce and salt as salt, not a combination of the two) and as such, will not be replacing this bottle.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 1
Flavor: 3
Flexibility: 5
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 3
Overall: 3
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
Brick and Mortar Hot Sauce Locations in Ogden, Utah
The last time I did a post on this subject, near the start of this blog, I casually referenced this place and noted it was in a Quilted Bear in the Newgate Mall of Ogden, Utah. Truth be told, it is a part of Quilted Bear, not a subset. The receipt says Quilted Bear, you pay Quilted Bear and Burn Your Tongue/Simply Spicy Stuff is just another of their vendors.
This is not to take anything away from both of them, who teamed up to do a really special and neat thing, but you are shopping at Quilted Bear and the hot sauce is basically almost dead center in the middle of the store. Selection covers the range of sauces from Louisiana style all the way to fruit style and from mild all the way to the extract-laden yuckfests with their stratospheric SHU ratings. It's all there, even if it often is just 1 bottle or so to represent a given area in the whole gamut.
The bottles are very competitively priced, to the point where if they had the selection, I would not ever need to utilize the web to order sauces. Given the somewhat miniscule selection of sauce lines, however, that is not quite the case, but the next go-around, I will be mining Chili & Max in Salt Lake rather than going online. I wound up with 10 different sauces, including another bottle of my Sauce Of The Year 2012, CaJohn's Happy Beaver, but I don't think it will be too long for that trip.
The service here is nothing short of phenomenal and I may wind up there again, just to deal with the wonderful girls at that place. That part was truly my pleasure and possibly I can see about ordering some sauces if I don't find something new that I haven't already tried, am able to eat and am interested. This, by far, is the best hot sauce shop in Utah and it's not really a hot sauce shop. The city of Ogden and its attendant chileheads are truly fortunate to have such a place. I wish we did here.
More of my thoughts can be found in my Yelp review on this business.
This is not to take anything away from both of them, who teamed up to do a really special and neat thing, but you are shopping at Quilted Bear and the hot sauce is basically almost dead center in the middle of the store. Selection covers the range of sauces from Louisiana style all the way to fruit style and from mild all the way to the extract-laden yuckfests with their stratospheric SHU ratings. It's all there, even if it often is just 1 bottle or so to represent a given area in the whole gamut.
The bottles are very competitively priced, to the point where if they had the selection, I would not ever need to utilize the web to order sauces. Given the somewhat miniscule selection of sauce lines, however, that is not quite the case, but the next go-around, I will be mining Chili & Max in Salt Lake rather than going online. I wound up with 10 different sauces, including another bottle of my Sauce Of The Year 2012, CaJohn's Happy Beaver, but I don't think it will be too long for that trip.
The service here is nothing short of phenomenal and I may wind up there again, just to deal with the wonderful girls at that place. That part was truly my pleasure and possibly I can see about ordering some sauces if I don't find something new that I haven't already tried, am able to eat and am interested. This, by far, is the best hot sauce shop in Utah and it's not really a hot sauce shop. The city of Ogden and its attendant chileheads are truly fortunate to have such a place. I wish we did here.
More of my thoughts can be found in my Yelp review on this business.
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Ghost Of Ancho Hot Sauce Review
Born To Hula Ghost Of Ancho Hot Sauce - [TSAAF Sauce Of The Year 2014]
UPDATE: I hate to write this type of thing, but it cannot go unmentioned. This product has been reformulated since I wrote this review. I don't know if the bottle I had was a placeholder formulation or the exact specifics, but having had the reformulation, it is far from the same sauce. The reformulation would be nowhere near any SOTY criteria for me, and is flatly awful, but as I leave other sauces now discontinued posted, I will leave this here, as a monument to posterity of a sauce that once was.
Though it has taken me, as of this writing, about 5 weeks to post again, I think I can make a strong and bold claim that this will be a good year for hot sauce for me, as it has started in spectacular fashion as soon as I broke the seal on this bad boy and busted it out.
Because it had been a bit between when I ordered it and when I opened it, upon spinning the cap, I got a pretty solid blast of ghost chili, both in smell and in taste, but the most I shook it up, the more the smokiness merged with the wonderful blend they've devised here. The heat is a lot like Pure Death in that continuing to eat it, particularly with the healthy Habanero dose, will allow it to continue to build, but it never really gets too far out of hand. Like that other one, it is so skillfully blended and so tasty, it is very difficult to not continue eating it, though the flavors are drastically different.
This one has the warmth, though this is greatly simplifying things, of a cup of chili, with the punch of Habanero, tempered by the smokiness and bitter end with the Jolokia and with a good degree of front end and some very nice back end heat. In the mix are some of the other elements of chili, including red Bell pepper, which also adds a bit of sweetness. We see cumin, which adds nice earthiness and garlic, which lends a degree of roundness to things. The vinegar and lime elements keep this from getting too bogged down, so we have a very solid sauce that is neither too thin nor too thick, nor too light nor too heavy, but a very nice medium of all those things, though I think this is the hottest in BTH's line-up and both the Habaneros and Ghosts make their presence known, in taste and feel. This makes this flexible enough to work well with Italian food, one of the more difficult types to mesh with hot sauce in general, though it does take a backseat to Pure Death in this department.
Bottom line: In any year, this is a Sauce Of The Year candidate, which is why I say it's going to be a great year for hot sauce, starting off the year with this strong of a contender, which instantly emerges as the full-on leader. This particular sauce has won numerous awards already and it's very easy to see why this gets (and deserves) so many accolades. Probably in the Top 5 sauces I've had overall, historically.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 6
Flavor: 10
Flexibility: 9
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10
Overall: 9
UPDATE: I hate to write this type of thing, but it cannot go unmentioned. This product has been reformulated since I wrote this review. I don't know if the bottle I had was a placeholder formulation or the exact specifics, but having had the reformulation, it is far from the same sauce. The reformulation would be nowhere near any SOTY criteria for me, and is flatly awful, but as I leave other sauces now discontinued posted, I will leave this here, as a monument to posterity of a sauce that once was. Though it has taken me, as of this writing, about 5 weeks to post again, I think I can make a strong and bold claim that this will be a good year for hot sauce for me, as it has started in spectacular fashion as soon as I broke the seal on this bad boy and busted it out.
Because it had been a bit between when I ordered it and when I opened it, upon spinning the cap, I got a pretty solid blast of ghost chili, both in smell and in taste, but the most I shook it up, the more the smokiness merged with the wonderful blend they've devised here. The heat is a lot like Pure Death in that continuing to eat it, particularly with the healthy Habanero dose, will allow it to continue to build, but it never really gets too far out of hand. Like that other one, it is so skillfully blended and so tasty, it is very difficult to not continue eating it, though the flavors are drastically different.
This one has the warmth, though this is greatly simplifying things, of a cup of chili, with the punch of Habanero, tempered by the smokiness and bitter end with the Jolokia and with a good degree of front end and some very nice back end heat. In the mix are some of the other elements of chili, including red Bell pepper, which also adds a bit of sweetness. We see cumin, which adds nice earthiness and garlic, which lends a degree of roundness to things. The vinegar and lime elements keep this from getting too bogged down, so we have a very solid sauce that is neither too thin nor too thick, nor too light nor too heavy, but a very nice medium of all those things, though I think this is the hottest in BTH's line-up and both the Habaneros and Ghosts make their presence known, in taste and feel. This makes this flexible enough to work well with Italian food, one of the more difficult types to mesh with hot sauce in general, though it does take a backseat to Pure Death in this department.
Bottom line: In any year, this is a Sauce Of The Year candidate, which is why I say it's going to be a great year for hot sauce, starting off the year with this strong of a contender, which instantly emerges as the full-on leader. This particular sauce has won numerous awards already and it's very easy to see why this gets (and deserves) so many accolades. Probably in the Top 5 sauces I've had overall, historically.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 6
Flavor: 10
Flexibility: 9
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 10
Overall: 9
Sunday, December 22, 2013
Best Hot Sauce 2013 + Recap
One year to the date of the last post of this type and, once again, I find myself suffering from a slight flu. Unlike last year, I knew for quite a while, since early May this year, what the likely winner for my Sauce Of The Year would be and while there were other contenders before it, nothing else was really close after it. More on that later.
One major difference between this year and last is that while I ran this journal for an entire full year this time, due to a job shift in October, my sauce usage has dropped off notably, both due to my daily course of events (several of which see me on the road more frequently - at least for now) as well as not having the same refrigerator arrangement, which severely cuts down on my ability to enjoy the hot sauce at work. Possibly, I will start returning home for lunches (right now I'm building a database of lunch spots, both to increase the coverage on my Yelp account and to have a list of good, reliable spots to take clients) and thereby be able to start picking up again on the sauces, but for now, it's pretty much usage just at home.
I also participated in and assisted Scott Roberts with his Tournament to determine the "One True" sauce, the sauce to end all sauces, as it were, but that tourney seems to have gone by the wayside, I'm guessing because of his recent domicile move as well as a site re-design and perhaps just the normal everyday activities taking time and precedence. I also have joined the staff of a food website my wife is trying to do, though at the moment it is down for an overhaul.
Very little changed on my overall ongoing list for most of this year. Here it is, once again:
*Emeritus Everyday sauce: Trappey's Red Devil
*Everyday sauce: Blair’s Pure Death Sauce
*Grilling sauce: CaJohn's Bourbon-Infused Chipotle Habanero (BICH)
Mexican-style sauce: El Yucateco Green
*Emeritus Asian-style sauce: Huy Fong Chili-Garlic Sauce
Asian-style sauce: Wicked Cactus Wrath Of The Tiger
Louisiana-style sauce: Trappey's Red Devil
Sweet-hot sauce: CaJohn's Happy Beaver
*Wife's sauce: Danny Cash's Salvation Garlic-Serrano and/or Bottled-Up Anger
*= Not looking for a replacement
If that didn't give it away, I may as well just announce now that my Sauce Of The Year for 2013 goes to Blair's Pure Death. While my review of it covers things pretty well, I'd like to add, some months removed, that this is still one of the best-tasting sauces it has been my pleasure to have. I also have been personally and directly responsible for selling about 100 bottles of it in this area alone this year. If there is a drawback to this, it would be the price point, which would do a good job making me go broke trying to keep myself in sauce if I tried to eat this as much as I really would like. I have eaten this more than any single other sauce and it has dethroned the mighty Red Devil as my overall favorite sauce currently, no small feat, considering how many years running Red Devil held that title. Still, from the moment I tasted it, it was pretty much love from the jump and the heat level, while it could be just a touch higher, is nearly right on the level. Finding a sauce like that...it makes all the testing and all the crappy sauces endured worthwhile. Those are the moments we live for. Congratulations to Blair Lazar and I thank you tremendously for making such a fantastic sauce!
Before I go, I thought I'd throw up some site statistics:
Total posts (not counting this): 82
Total views: 2966 (should be 3K+ before the end of the year)
Total single sauce reviews: 59
Total double sauce reviews: 1
Total sauces reviewed: 61
Total unopened sauces waiting on shelf for review and/or consumption: 3
Total opened sauces waiting for review: 0
Total open bottles in fridge: 12
Door sauces: 10
Back of fridge sauces: 2
Highest viewed review: 101 - Valentina's Extra Hot
Highest viewed article, any type: 101 - Valentina's Extra Hot
Most posts, month: 10 - June 2013
Most sauces reviewed, month - 8, June 2013
Once I finish going through the sauces in the door, which will probably be mid-Jan., at the latest, I'm planning on a larger-scale shopping trip through one of the local places to pick up on some sauces I haven't gotten to yet. Unless I order direct, quite a few I'm interested in will continue to remain unobtainable to me, since I don't wind up going to the hot sauce events and probably won't be anytime soon, either. If it is the shop I've never been to, I'll probably comment on the store, if nothing else, via my Yelp account.
I don't really see sauces in 2014 being reviewed on the level they were this year, due mostly to those shifts I mentioned earlier as well as a likely domicile move of my own sometime in the near future. I'm also pretty happy with the current line-up and aside from the Mexican-style sauces, am not really looking especially hard for new sauces. I still generally will look to see what might be on the shelves everytime I visit either a new place or somewhere I haven't been in a while (and I see a lot of new labels, more and more all the time), but things are a bit less urgent currently.
At any rate, I hope you've enjoyed (and continue to enjoy) reading and thank you for coming along.
See you in 2014!
One major difference between this year and last is that while I ran this journal for an entire full year this time, due to a job shift in October, my sauce usage has dropped off notably, both due to my daily course of events (several of which see me on the road more frequently - at least for now) as well as not having the same refrigerator arrangement, which severely cuts down on my ability to enjoy the hot sauce at work. Possibly, I will start returning home for lunches (right now I'm building a database of lunch spots, both to increase the coverage on my Yelp account and to have a list of good, reliable spots to take clients) and thereby be able to start picking up again on the sauces, but for now, it's pretty much usage just at home.
I also participated in and assisted Scott Roberts with his Tournament to determine the "One True" sauce, the sauce to end all sauces, as it were, but that tourney seems to have gone by the wayside, I'm guessing because of his recent domicile move as well as a site re-design and perhaps just the normal everyday activities taking time and precedence. I also have joined the staff of a food website my wife is trying to do, though at the moment it is down for an overhaul.
Very little changed on my overall ongoing list for most of this year. Here it is, once again:
*Emeritus Everyday sauce: Trappey's Red Devil
*Everyday sauce: Blair’s Pure Death Sauce
*Grilling sauce: CaJohn's Bourbon-Infused Chipotle Habanero (BICH)
Mexican-style sauce: El Yucateco Green
*Emeritus Asian-style sauce: Huy Fong Chili-Garlic Sauce
Asian-style sauce: Wicked Cactus Wrath Of The Tiger
Louisiana-style sauce: Trappey's Red Devil
Sweet-hot sauce: CaJohn's Happy Beaver
*Wife's sauce: Danny Cash's Salvation Garlic-Serrano and/or Bottled-Up Anger
*= Not looking for a replacement
If that didn't give it away, I may as well just announce now that my Sauce Of The Year for 2013 goes to Blair's Pure Death. While my review of it covers things pretty well, I'd like to add, some months removed, that this is still one of the best-tasting sauces it has been my pleasure to have. I also have been personally and directly responsible for selling about 100 bottles of it in this area alone this year. If there is a drawback to this, it would be the price point, which would do a good job making me go broke trying to keep myself in sauce if I tried to eat this as much as I really would like. I have eaten this more than any single other sauce and it has dethroned the mighty Red Devil as my overall favorite sauce currently, no small feat, considering how many years running Red Devil held that title. Still, from the moment I tasted it, it was pretty much love from the jump and the heat level, while it could be just a touch higher, is nearly right on the level. Finding a sauce like that...it makes all the testing and all the crappy sauces endured worthwhile. Those are the moments we live for. Congratulations to Blair Lazar and I thank you tremendously for making such a fantastic sauce!
Before I go, I thought I'd throw up some site statistics:
Total posts (not counting this): 82
Total views: 2966 (should be 3K+ before the end of the year)
Total single sauce reviews: 59
Total double sauce reviews: 1
Total sauces reviewed: 61
Total unopened sauces waiting on shelf for review and/or consumption: 3
Total opened sauces waiting for review: 0
Total open bottles in fridge: 12
Door sauces: 10
Back of fridge sauces: 2
Highest viewed review: 101 - Valentina's Extra Hot
Highest viewed article, any type: 101 - Valentina's Extra Hot
Most posts, month: 10 - June 2013
Most sauces reviewed, month - 8, June 2013
Once I finish going through the sauces in the door, which will probably be mid-Jan., at the latest, I'm planning on a larger-scale shopping trip through one of the local places to pick up on some sauces I haven't gotten to yet. Unless I order direct, quite a few I'm interested in will continue to remain unobtainable to me, since I don't wind up going to the hot sauce events and probably won't be anytime soon, either. If it is the shop I've never been to, I'll probably comment on the store, if nothing else, via my Yelp account.
I don't really see sauces in 2014 being reviewed on the level they were this year, due mostly to those shifts I mentioned earlier as well as a likely domicile move of my own sometime in the near future. I'm also pretty happy with the current line-up and aside from the Mexican-style sauces, am not really looking especially hard for new sauces. I still generally will look to see what might be on the shelves everytime I visit either a new place or somewhere I haven't been in a while (and I see a lot of new labels, more and more all the time), but things are a bit less urgent currently.
At any rate, I hope you've enjoyed (and continue to enjoy) reading and thank you for coming along.
See you in 2014!
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Wildfire Hot Sauce Review
Motherlode Provisions Wildfire Hot Sauce
This is one I found in a Whole Foods, though unlike the Archer Farms of last week, Motherlode Provisions appears to be an independent company and not an arm of Whole Foods. There were a few different hot sauce flasks on the shelf and I chose this one because it was the spiciest available.
Generally, when buying hot sauce in flasks, one can be fairly certain, with few exceptions, that they won't be particularly hot and this one is not (in a list of about 20 ingredients, no peppers of any kind show up until #7). Generally also, if you see Arbol listed in the ingredients, you can also look more towards expecting a sort of Mexican table sauce, which is probably where this would more closely fit in. With the use of Piquins, one of the most under-used peppers, along with Pepins, I somewhat had my hopes up that I would see a sort of novel or inventive flair to the sauce, but clearly, they were mostly using the Piquins (appearing here in powdered form) to spike the heat level of the sauce upward.
This is essentially a Mexican table sauce, but on the hotter end, as those things go, somewhat slightly, but still noticeably hotter than the Valentina Extra Hot (reviewed elsewhere here). It is a much smoother and tastier sauce than that one and because of the sort of blanket nature of those sauces, this one is very adaptable across a fairly wide variety of foods. It's a good-tasting sauce, but not a great one, probably closer to Cholula in terms of actual taste. Given that it's retailed at Whole Foods, I probably overpaid for it (like nearly everything else in that store), but in terms of the actual sauce itself, it's overall a pretty good value for the money.
Bottom line: If my wife likes this, it might be the Mexican table or general hot sauce we keep on hand. Most of my stuff is far too hot for her and though she doesn't eat a lot of hot sauce, she does have it often enough that a complaint is raised if we don't have some on hand. Of the Mexican table sauce style, this is probably the one I find most favorable, though far from perfect. Definitely worth a try if you haven't had it before and enjoy that kind of sauce.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 3
Flavor: 6
Flexibility: 6
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 4
Overall: 5
This is one I found in a Whole Foods, though unlike the Archer Farms of last week, Motherlode Provisions appears to be an independent company and not an arm of Whole Foods. There were a few different hot sauce flasks on the shelf and I chose this one because it was the spiciest available.Generally, when buying hot sauce in flasks, one can be fairly certain, with few exceptions, that they won't be particularly hot and this one is not (in a list of about 20 ingredients, no peppers of any kind show up until #7). Generally also, if you see Arbol listed in the ingredients, you can also look more towards expecting a sort of Mexican table sauce, which is probably where this would more closely fit in. With the use of Piquins, one of the most under-used peppers, along with Pepins, I somewhat had my hopes up that I would see a sort of novel or inventive flair to the sauce, but clearly, they were mostly using the Piquins (appearing here in powdered form) to spike the heat level of the sauce upward.
This is essentially a Mexican table sauce, but on the hotter end, as those things go, somewhat slightly, but still noticeably hotter than the Valentina Extra Hot (reviewed elsewhere here). It is a much smoother and tastier sauce than that one and because of the sort of blanket nature of those sauces, this one is very adaptable across a fairly wide variety of foods. It's a good-tasting sauce, but not a great one, probably closer to Cholula in terms of actual taste. Given that it's retailed at Whole Foods, I probably overpaid for it (like nearly everything else in that store), but in terms of the actual sauce itself, it's overall a pretty good value for the money.
Bottom line: If my wife likes this, it might be the Mexican table or general hot sauce we keep on hand. Most of my stuff is far too hot for her and though she doesn't eat a lot of hot sauce, she does have it often enough that a complaint is raised if we don't have some on hand. Of the Mexican table sauce style, this is probably the one I find most favorable, though far from perfect. Definitely worth a try if you haven't had it before and enjoy that kind of sauce.
Breakdown:
Heat level: 3
Flavor: 6
Flexibility: 6
Enjoyment to dollar factor: 4
Overall: 5
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