I thought these might interest a few of you

CaJohn’s Lava Dome Autographed ’06 CaJohns Hot Sauce
CaJohn’s Log Cabin Autographed CaJohns Hot Sauce
Blair’s N-59 N59 Reserve Hot Sauce Blairs #42

While loading a 1200 case order for a distributor Blair’s shipping dept got a little too heavy on the reverse pedal and backed Blair’s 6000lb Fork lift into a pallet of 300 cases of Freshly Made Sauce! Fortunately, no sauces were harmed.

Blair was kind enough to send this “Embarrising Moment” Over to HSB….

After a long, hard day at the office, nothings better than a nice quality slab of beef cooked to your liking. I like a good steak almost any way it comes.

But since I purchased a nice cut of Angus KC strip last weekend, I’ve been waiting patiently to test out a good rub to spice things up a bit. With the arrival of my Memphis Sweet Heat Dry rub, the wait was finally over.

Ingredients: Garlic Salt, Ancho Chile Peppers, Molasses, Coffee, Onions, and Natural Spices

Nothing too fancy. The coffee was unexpected, and the garlic salt had promise. I applied a generous amount to my steak, then set it off cooking. I broiled it for 10 minutes on one side and 3 minutes on the other, to a perfect medium.

Before Rub

Plain No More

Ready to Eat!

Overall the taste was pretty good. There was a lot of garlic, but it wasn’t overpowering. No roasty coffee tones to be found, and gosh did I look. It was mildly sweet, but nowhere near the Memphis sweet sauces I’m used to. And the heat was non-existant.

The label states “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.” Well, with the lack of heat, this rub won’t have anyone running away anytime soon. It tastes decent and makes a nice addition to a meal, but it’s neither sweet enough nor hot enough to wear the label it does.

Aside from the lack of heat, there’s nothing bad about this rub. So, if you’re looking for flavor, Memphis Sweet Heat Dry Rub will get the job done.

Overall Rating: 6.0 out of 10

So close, yet so far away…

Well, I finally got my bottle – sort of (Original Placeholder)

September 8th, 9th & 10th seem so far away, but it’s about time to start thinking about travel plans. (or even deciding if you’re going).

I booked a flight this weekend, so that’s taken care of and I’ll be sharing a room with a fellow HSBer at the AmeriSuites Stockyards (smack dab in the middle of the action). If you want to save some money, it’s a good idea to split a room – plus it’s like Vegas, your room is just a place to sleep and change clothes.

Beyond travel plans, there are shirt plans in the works plus additional HSBer events that I’m trying to get kick started, so stay tuned for more info on that.

So who is planning on going this year?

A ton of new products have been added to the Sweat ‘N Spice website in the last few days (and there’s still more!). You’ve read a few reviews of some of the new stuff already and reviews of even more are still in the works – so stay tuned. In the interim, you can get some of the new stuff for yourself.

And just for kicks, the first person that names which two item product photos do not match the others gets a free item from the list above (sets & bear excluded). That means you have to look at all the new products to figure it out. Clever huh?

Ok my fellow chileheads, collector’s, connoisseurs of hot sauce, those interested in learning about all things hot, and the ones that I can refer to as my brothers.

It seems that HSB has grown into quite the place over the last several months. With this growth we have kept Nick busy with all of our suggestions, comments, new ideas, and all of our antics. Somehow Nick manages to stay on top of all this by constantly adapting to our ever growing needs.

HSB has kept us on top of all the latest from the Blair’s Holiday/B-99 Reserve, to Defcon days. It has kept us tuned into the events from NM during the Fiery Foods Show and has supported us through the long weeks during the famous cutting-room floor contest where 6 of the 10 winners have called HSB home. It has spawned its own Hot Sauce and has brought a group bonded by a common interest together to create their own signed bottle.

It has introduced many new faces and sauces and always has room to welcome more. We now have a pimp your sauce, a place to sell and trade, and even a place to chat about whatever you feel. Almost everything a chilehead can imagine you will find here.

I personally want to thank Nick for all he has done and will continue to do to make HSB what it is.

There have been many friendships made and many battles fought.
In the end I think we all can agree.
There can’t always be harmony, but there will always be a chilehead bond.
Here on the HSB.

~ Chris K.

For the times when it’s just not hot enough! Have you ever been to a restaurant and the hot sauce is wimpy? You have the answer.

This is a great idea – a keychain vial filled with [tag]jalapeno[/tag] pepper powder that goes anywhere.

I go to great lengths to make sure that I have good hot sauce nearby wherever I go. A few bottles at work, one in the glove box of my car (my wife hasn’t let me stash one in her car yet) and a bottle in my briefcase. When I think ahead, I often bring a bottle of hot sauce with me to restaurants. But, with all those efforts, there are still times when I want to spice something up and don’t have a good sauce at hand. In comes Captain Thom and his fantastic Jalapeno Chili Head Survival Kit.

The jalapeno powder has an excellent pepper flavor and a nice kick. The container can be easily refilled, so this is a purchase that will continue to be useful for a long time. The top is threaded on with a sealing o-ring that does a very good job of keeping any powder from escaping while the vial is closed; but the one complaint I have is that it would have been awfully nice to locate the o-ring below the threads rather than above. As it is, a tiny bit of powder escapes every time I unscrew it. But that’s probably a picky point from the mind of an engineer. The vial seems durable enough, which is important – I wouldn’t want it to break at an inopportune moment and send a cloud of pepper dust into the air.

I gave Captain Thom’s a try at the local J. Alexander’s. They have a great pasta dish called Rattlesnake Pasta that consists of grilled chicken and bell peppers in a cayenne-cream sauce. It has a little zip to it, but not nearly enough for my liking (unfortunately, the pictures I took of the meal didn’t come out.) Their only hot sauce option is tabasco, and the vinegar in that ruins the dish for me. So, I whipped out the Captain Thom’s Jalapeno Keychain, and dumped a bunch in.

The heat addition was great. This powder must have squeezed every bit of capsaicin right out of those jalapenos – the heat is impressive for the variety. And the mixing of jalapeno flavor with the cayenne was simply delightful. The use of the vial was simple, clean and unobtrusive. Resealing was simple. And since the vial is big enough to hold a good amount of powder but small enough to fit right in on a keychain, it really can go anywhere.

Captain Thom’s Jalapeno Chili Head Survival kit is a great idea. It will be a mainstay on my keychain for a long time to come, ensuring I never again have to deal with bland food.

Memphis Mojo Smokin Heat Hot Sauce comes in a flask-style bottle, which I like for pourability as well as space efficiency in the fridge. It’s an habanero sauce, which is a new combination for me with Memphis spices.

Ingredients: Vinegar, smoked habanero peppers, tomatoes, garlic, salt, xantham gum and natural spices

On First Taste
The aroma of Memphis Mojo is heavily laden with Memphis-style smokey spice, not unlike what you’ll find at any good Memphis Barbecue joint, and a pretty good whiff of vinegar. The taste stays pretty true to the nose, with lots of smoke and vinegar to top. This isn’t you’re plain boring heavy vinegar sauce, though – the vinegar pairs very nicely with the spices to provide a very good, very unusual taste.

The sauce is on the thin side, pouring quickly. It tastes more like [tag]barbecue sauce[/tag] than a typical [tag]hot sauce[/tag]. With the heavy vinegar flavor, it reminds me most of a good Carolina BBQ sauce. The heavy smoke and spices are pure Memphis BBQ, though, and together it makes for a great blend that’s quite unlike anything I’ve had before.

On Food
I liberally applied Memphis Mojo to a breakfast sandwich. It was a little thin to stick to the eggs well, but it soaked into the roll nicely and got the job done. The flavor is simply fantastic. The heat is sufficient, not a big burner but enough to get a tingle going. The heat’s the only place you find evidence of the habanero, as I couldn’t detect any habanero flavor. That’s fine, though, since there’s more than enough complexity going on as it is.

I can’t wait to give Memphis Mojo Smokin’ Hot Sauce a try on a pulled pork sandwich, and it would excel on any type of BBQ. It’d be a great dipping sauce as well, and substitute ably anywhere you’d use barbecue sauce. This bottle will be getting a lot of play in my rotation.

Overall Rating: 8.1 out of 10

Okay, so the mailing of the labels has begun. The international folks (UK & Canda) should be receiving the labels in the next few days and signing them and sending them off. The labels will then come back to me because we are missing the addresses for the following folks:

• Hot Sauce Head
• Tasker

If you’re on the list above, please send your mailing address to nick ‘@’ hotsauceblog.com – If your address is not received by the second round of label mailings, you will be left out.

A tracking thread will be set up once the first signer receives the labels and notifies me.