Melinda’s Dry Hot Sauce – All Purpose Habanero Seasoning

Of interest regarding the mighty habanero is its sheer versatility in the hands of product manufacturers – and its vulnerability. I’ve come to terms with the fact that not everything crafted with our beloved pepper – even as the feature ingredient, lives up to one’s expectations for mouth fuel. Alas, the curse of the chilehead.

To illustrate my point, I offer Melinda’s Dry Hot Sauce. We’re all familiar with the Figueroa Brothers’ product line, which has been around for a while – the habanero-based sauces with more X’s on them than, well, ahem. A whole lotta X’s going on with Melinda. This product doesn’t have any, so I guess it could be rated G, as interpreted from the “all purpose” classification. In fact, nowhere on the bottle does it mention the heat level of the product – but that’s okay for now.

This being my first-ever powdered heat condiment, chile powders aside, (their most likely source), I was definitely curious as to its zing factor. Back to the brand, though. Before I discovered online catalogues and specialty shops, over ten years ago, my hot sauce options were severely limited. Forget supermarkets. If you wanted something off the beaten path, your best bet was an all-natural or gourmet foods store. They might have something a bit more adventurous than the vinegar-based crowd.

That’s where I remember first picking up some Melinda’s along with another similar brand from Costa Rica with a big, colorful toucan on it. These pretty-labeled mild to medium sauces were great stepping-stones toward the eventual volcanoes we’ve come to inhabit. They built your confidence and credibility. Along with the habs, other ingredients like carrots and papaya are added, which provide texture, but also restrict the heat. Why do that, I always thought.

It is no wonder then, that reviewing this product became nostalgic, bringing me back before I tried Dave’s, Blair’s or Ashley’s tongue twisters. So I had a perfect occasion to test it. This past weekend, Lambertville, NJ celebrated its annual Shad Festival, and a few friends and I decided to check it out. Arriving late on Saturday, with the festival already closing down, I was a bit disappointed, although we could re-attend it on Sunday.

The surprise came when one of my friends already there, found out that the Shad hadn’t run yet, so there was none to be savored. Not grilled, fried, broiled and no roe – nada. (Lambertville lies along the Delaware River and the Shad enter it annually from the Atlantic, apparently one of their few chosen spots on the Eastern seaboard). So we dubbed it the Shadless Fest.

He had tried a crab-cake and a pulled pork sandwich, neither being remarkable and then pointed out all the cell phone, bank and other not-remotely-related-to Shad kiosks present. Some festival, I thought (we say fish but we mean fishy), content that I hadn’t missed anything spectacular. After a trip to Suzie’s Hot Sauce shop, in town, we headed to a local brewery, ordered some apps and cracked open a bottle of Ring of Fire Original to dress them with. Now that’s a tasty hab product. I realized later that this was a grave mistake, because we inadvertently compared the heat and flavor of this most excellent sauce to the Melinda’s Dry Hot Sauce later, which I was actually eager to impress my friends with, having brought it along.

That evening, grilling lamburgers with smoked mozzarella tucked inside, on my little Weber, we setup camp at a nearby state park where we had a site reserved. The good thing about Melinda’s Dry Hot Sauce is its handy size, perfect for a tailgate or a camping trip, where you want most of your accompaniments in a less-than-Costco size. So I rubbed down our patties generously with this Dry Hot Sauce.

Immediately I noticed that the powder was clumped together and barely came through the sifter. They should add an anti-caking agent or make bigger holes in the sifter, because I popped the top off, mixed it around, put it back on and it still wouldn’t shake out.

One of my impatient friends came by and put a good dollop on his finger, expecting, I dunno – fireworks maybe, and when he said “It tastes like breadcrumbs,” my tail nestled between my legs. No, I thought, it has to have more flavor than that. It was like serving a bad wine to your best table. The huge fire we had going in the pit didn’t help matters either.

Sadly, he was right. It does taste (and smell) like breadcrumbs, with the faintest tickle of heat, too shy to come out and play. Sodium is only 25 mg, which is fine if you’re watching your intake, but this dry hot sauce seriously lacked flavor, never mind heat. Maybe they need more product development, but I would consider dumping the entire bottle into sour cream and calling it a dip – adding salt to taste.

It seems to me that this product doesn’t fit that well into its category – it needs something else, and a good helping of it. If I want heat in powdered form, I’d go right to a good chile – Arbol, Chipotle, Hab, what have you. (I have a powerful chile powder mix I bought from an Asian market that keeps in a jar, and I swear as soon as I open it up I start sneezing).

For all-purpose seasoning, I go with Tony Chacere’s or Paul Prudhomme’s, or I blend my own. Heck, even Emeril’s is halfway decent. Melinda’s Dry Hot Sauce has more fillers than heat or flavor – hence the sawdust composition. You’d get better flavor just using salt and pepper. Even Ms. Dash no-sodium has more flare.

To be fair, I gave Melinda a second chance tonight. My dinner was simple – a salad with Ponzu sauce and sesame oil (makes a great dressing) and some giardiniera, brown rice and grilled chicken in an Indian-inspired lentil salad with fresh herbs and spices . Ok, so I mix weird foods – but I try to keep it generally healthy.

As you can see, I sprinkled the dry hot sauce over the whole dish. I had to add Tabasco peppers to my lentil salad, simply because my good ole’ tastebuds hold me for ransom during most meals, and from our previous lamburgers, I knew that the little powder that could – wouldn’t.

I had to bid Melinda farewell, without a kiss goodnight. Call me a heat-seeking snob, but I can’t say this product impressed me in the least. It seems to be a product extension for those with truly sensitive taste buds, or people minding their hypertension. When I come across habanero products like this, I reach for a tissue box, because it make me want to cry – not from intense heat, but from the extreme lack thereof. In my book, the sauce is still boss.

Appearance: Granulated spices/sawdust
Smell: A little on the earthy/musty side
Taste: Breadcrumbs. I have to add hot sauce to this to get some flavor out of it.
Heat: N/A; almost undetectable.
Overall: Sorry to be harsh to a well-established brand, but I wouldn’t recommend this product. Stick to an old-fashioned hot sauce, or if you are in some situation where you can’t use a liquid and require powdered heat (Mars maybe), use a dried chili powder. However, if you are watching your sodium intake, this product may be for you, but you’ll have to find a way to add more heat.
Ingredients: Pepper sauce powder (peppers, salt, vinegar, natural tocopherol), citric acid, garlic, onion, habanero powder, carrot powder, maltodextrin, modified food starch, natural flavors, sugar.
Manufacturer’s Info: Figueroa Brothers, Inc. Kenner, LA, 70062, www.melindas.com
Product Pricing: 1.12 oz shaker for $4.89 directly from the manufacturer.

Please join me in welcoming Daniel to the HSB reviewer ranks. Daniel is a true chilehead and very eager to get into the wide world of hot sauces. Welcome Daniel!

Okay gang, this is my first official review for HSB, so go easy – and greetings from Jersey City, NJ. I’ve got a real winner on my hands and I’m excited to share the news. Valentina Salsa Picante is a Mexican style hot sauce available in Original and Extra Hot versions, either in a 12 oz. or a mammoth 34 oz. bottle, about the size of a small vase.

I scored the extra hot big mama on sale today for a whopping two bucks at a local Spanish supermarket, which is where you’ll most likely find it, if not in your Spanish foods aisle. Can you say recession-friendly pricing? Also, you can try your luck at a bodega, or as a last resort, mexgrocer.com. Anyway, it shouldn’t be that hard to find if you do a little digging.

First off, I love the large sized bottle; it makes a statement that you’ve arrived as a culinary heat-seeker, or you’re a chef. Sitting on the table, it just can’t be ignored, you’ll be tempted to drizzle some on your corn flakes. The label is nondescript but that’s fine – take a look at the beautiful rusty red liquid surrounding it. What you have here is an authentic Mexican hot sauce that obviously, at 34 oz., wants to be taken to the dance quite often.

A run-down of the ingredients: Water, chili peppers, vinegar, salt, spices and a dash of sodium benzoate for preservation.

If you enjoy the liberal use of a Louisiana style table sauce, you’ll definitely want to pucker up to this one. For comparison, this sauce is much smoother, a bit thicker and lacks the strong vinegar twang common to the aforementioned style. The color and consistency are reminiscent of some of the hot wing sauces, a burnt-orange to reddish hue, and it clings well to whatever you use it on – it’s not runny.

Now for the taste: I bought a bottle of this to keep at my parent’s house, and during a recent gathering, I noticed my father had poured some in a ramekin and was serving it alongside tortilla chips. He does weird things like that, but it didn’t stop me from digging in. Salsa would have been preferable but I guess they ran out. Shame! Anyway, it was the perfect snack to wash down with a frosty one – it was that good as a standalone.

What I noticed about this sauce is that the chili pepper mash is of excellent quality – that’s what lingers. This full-bodied sauce is rich, very well blended and it’s the peppers that hold the stage – not the salt or vinegar. As far as heat, it has a nice bite that hangs around for a while, like that which a proper chili would offer, but not as pronounced. (A really good, spiced chili has a demonic way of not letting you do anything else but eat more of it, as you cry and sniffle on a cloud of endorphins – nothing else like it).

To me, this is a true chilehead’s table sauce. Since I prefer my general sauce a bit hotter than this, I usually end up going through the bottle fairly quickly, then when I get about 1/3 of the way through it, I add a blend of other already-opened sauces and a few dashes of a superhot to create a custom blend, so Valentina also makes for a terrific base if you’re into this sort of thing. Then I’ll reuse my emptied 5 ounce bottles, fill it with this mix and give it to friends as gifts – they always like to keep up with your heat tolerance it seems.

For this review I bought some Spanish food at a local cucina (kitchen), which consisted of seasoned rice and beans (mixed together, called “morro”) and a few slices of beef, which they call “bistec” prepared in a light Creole sauce. I couldn’t resist getting an empanada, as these go particularly well with hot sauce. To round out my meal, once home, I added tortilla chips, a few slices of jack cheese, some salsa, a cherry pepper and a few olives. Then I poured the sauce over most of the platter and went to work, adding more sauce as needed.

Other pairings that I recommend with Valentina are chili, tamales, pasta, pizza, omelets and oh yes, the venerable Bloody Mary. Hummus too with olive-oil brushed, grilled pita chips, Mmm!

Hopefully this brand will increase its distribution in due time. For the regular price of about $3.50 for 32 ounces, the value is incontestable given the excellent quality product. While Tapatio tastes similar and is much easier to find, I still think the Extra Hot Valentina gives it a run for the money; it’s a bit deeper, spicier and more complex in flavor. With these two in the ring, you know which lady gets my vote.

Appearance: 7/10 Considering that this is an all-purpose sauce, it holds court compared to most of the vinegar-based commercial brands, bearing an interesting coloration of dark orange and brick red.

Aroma: 7/10 Spicy, slightly smoky with a hint of sweetness

Heat: 8/10 Compared to most other common table sauces found in supermarkets. Heat being subjective, for my war-weary taste buds this sauce is probably about a 5, but it’s the flavor that shines through here, not so much the heat, although it’s still generous.

Texture: 8/10 Very smooth, rich and well-blended. Not runny and clings well to food – I’m thinking buffalo wings.

Flavor: 8/10 Yum! Almost drinkable, boatloads of whatever kinds of chiles they use just swimming around in the mouth. Nice, long-lasting peppery finish. Heat doesn’t get in the way of those peppers, but escorts them down the aisle respectfully – you can taste this sauce. A nice departure from the ubiquitous vinegar-laden clan.

Overall: 8/10 This well-made sauce champions the chile, just the way it should be. Also, a hidden gem when it comes to value and a great base to make your own rocket fuel.