Ingredients: tomato puree (water, tomato paste), brown sugar, water, cider & distilled vinegar, soy sauce (water, wheat, soybeans, salt), hot sauce (peppers, distilled vinegar, salt), natural raspberry flavor, salt, hickory smoke flavor, chipotle peppers, modified food starch, dehydrated garlic, dehydrated onions, spices, Worcestershire sauce base (natural spices, distilled vinegar, hydrolyzed vegetable protein [contains soybeans], natural flavors)

It is the day after Christmas and I have some of the best leftovers just begging to be made into complete and new dishes! What better way to add another layer of flavor then with some great hot sauce. Or in this case some great BBQ sauce!

Now I can’t comment on the label because it is just a sample bottle. It just lets me know what is inside this jelly jar like bottle.

First and foremost the smell of the sauce is amazing! You get hit with the sweetness of the raspberry immediately, then the smell moves onto the wonderful smokiness of the chipotle pepper, and then I grasp the hint of black pepper (even though it does not state that on the ingredient list, I can smell it). It is truly mouth watering! Even the consistency is perfect! Stays where you put it, but doesn’t glob out of the bottle. And it is a beautiful sauce to look at, shiny and smooth with just small flecks of pepper and spices floating around the deep rich red sauce. I could not wait to taste it! I poured a small amount onto a spoon and tasted. WOW! You first taste the sweetness of the raspberry mixed in with the chipotle peppers and then just a hint of black pepper. This is a very savory sauce. The raspberry and chipotle pepper are so wonderfully balanced in this sauce that neither one flavor over powers the other. Not much heat but you forget that as you eat this sauce because the flavor is just so perfect!

I knew immediately what I was making with this sauce. I took some homemade roasted garlic mashed potatoes, some leftover roasted turkey, some leftover lemon and garlic asparagus, a dribble of turkey gravy, and a dribble of Mad Will’s Raspberry Chipotle Barbecue Sauce. The sauce made the dish shine! The turkey shone with the sweetness of the raspberries, the asparagus sung with the smokiness of the chipotle peppers, and the mashed potatoes added a wonderful creamy background for the sauce and gravy mixture where you could just detect a hint of black pepper. I couldn’t get enough of it!

Overall this sauce is great for all types of chili heads! The flavors are perfectly balanced in every way. I say from chicken nuggets to a leg of lamb, and everything in between, this sauce will add a whole new layer of flavor with your meal!

Packaging: n/a sample bottle
Aroma: 10/10 sweet and smokey
Appearance: 10/10 gorgeous, smooth and shiny
Taste: 8/10 AMAZING! Not much heat but PLENTY of flavor!
Heat: 4/10

Overall: 9/10

Check out their private label options:
Mad Will’s Food Company
450 Gough Street, Second Floor
San Francisco, CA 94102
Tel. 415-864-2693
Fax. 415-864-2794

From www.especiesexoticas.com:
Hot pepper sauce manufactured from a mix of tamarillo (a native fruit from the Andes), hot peppers and vinegar.

Tamarillo, also called Tree Tomato, is a very unique tropical fruit used in the andes region both for beverages and mostly to combine with hot peppers (aji) to create a mild, full flavored sauce!! A typical recipe from the andes region.

Suitable for adding spice to any kind of cooked meal such as; pastas, soups, rice, meats etc. Due to the coriander and the very typical Andes fruits, it is recommended for cooking, adding flavor and marinating Latin foods, such as ceviches and beans. It is based on a typical Ecuadorian Indian recipe.

Ingredients: tamarillo, tena pepper, vinegar, sugar, onions, cilantro, salt, xantham gum

OK, I have to say this sauce scared me from the very beginning. Just the look and the smell made me very nervous about trying it. Well, I finally got up the nerve to give it a try. I am either going to like it or not, it won’t kill me. I hope!

The packaging is very festive looking. I just want to play some salsa music and get moving. OK, so that is not the purpose of a label, I am supposed to want to eat it, but I am still afraid. But again, it tells me all the necessary information that the government wants displayed, so all in all it does it job.

The look of this sauce is very gel like with bits of green floating, not really floating more like being held in place by the gel like sauce. It has an orange red color. So, I finally work up the nerve to smell it. It smells like cold tomato sauce. Nothing else. OK, so now I am a little less scared. I try to pour it into a bowl to have a really good look at it. Key word, TRY. It has a shaker thing on top and this gel like sauce does not move easily out if it. I got more on the counter then in the bowl. But, it looks exactly the same as it does in the bottle.

Now, for the true test, taste. It tastes like cold tomato jelly with a little heat. It is basically your run of the mill hot sauce, except it is in gel form. It is not complex at all. Nothing to write home about. Now to be fair, I really should try it on food. So, I make my favorite breakfast, leftover homemade potato pancake, an over easy egg, and of course a slice of bacon (yes this bacon is from the famous Bacon Fairy). Now I am annoyed at trying to get this sauce out of this bottle and onto my food. After all my effort to get it onto my food it did nothing for it, no heat, no flavor, nada.

All in all I feel this is a great looking bottle to add to your collection on the shelf, not to the ones you have awaiting you in the fridge.

Packaging: 7/10 festive
Aroma: 6/10 cold tomatoes mixed with vinegar
Appearance: 3/10 scary orange/red jelly with green specks
Taste: 3/10 cold tomato jelly
Heat: 4/10 nothing to write home about

Especies Exóticas Cia. Ltda.
Quito, Ecuador. Southamerica
Phone/Fax: (593 2) 2040962
ole@especiesexoticas.com

From the label: “Smooth and silky with oven roasted garlic and fiery hot jalapeños!”

INGREDIENTS: jalapeño peppers (jalapeños, vinegar, calcium chloride, citric acid), oven roasted garlic, onion, water, salt, olive oil

When I first saw this sauce I thought how cool the shape of this 12 ounce bottle was. It reminded me of what my friend used to put his homemade beer in. Very cool. The label was the label. Nothing that screamed out to me but nothing that was out of control. It looked liked something I would find in my local supermarket. It did it’s job and that is all that really matters in the long run anyway.

Now, after sitting and thinking of days gone by filled with homemade brew I noticed the color of the sauce. Green. I mean GREEN. It reminded me of puree peas. I didn’t throw in the towel just yet though. Color means nothing. Taste means everything.

I opened the sauce and stuck my pretty little nose into the top of the bottle. WOW! If I was a vampire, I would have turned into dust at that moment. GARLIC, GARLIC, and more GARLIC was all I could smell. OK, so now it is time to see what this sauce looks and tastes like. I pour some into a small bowl. It is very smooth and you can see little pieces of garlic every so often. Now I must taste it. Yup, it is garlic I smell all right! Actually to be fair the first taste I get is garlic, then olive oil, and then I taste the jalapeños. There is a slight kick but it doesn’t linger long. Nothing to shed tears about, but something to enjoy.

OK, so now I have to get my mind to think of the best way to use this sauce. Marinade is the first thing to pop into my head. OK, chicken breast here I come!

I marinade it overnight and make a grilled chicken sandwich with bacon, cheese, lettuce, tomato, roasted red pepper, salt, pepper, and mayo for dinner. I serve this with a side of steamed artichoke. Now, before I make my sandwich I taste a piece of chicken. It gave it a great garlic flavor, but no heat. Now, I taste my sandwich. It is good, but no heat. I poured some on the plate to dip, still just garlic coming through. The sauce has seemed to lose any of the jalapeño taste once added to food.

Now all in all this sauce is good. You need to like, or rather LOVE, garlic to enjoy this sauce. It is a true garlic sauce for garlic lovers! The heat is OK on it’s own, but loses it’s kick once added to food. It is a great sauce for all garlic loving chefs out there! The consistency of the sauce is smooth, flows wonderfully, and stays where you put it.

Packaging: 7/10 cool bottle
Aroma: 10/10 garlic (it is called Gourmet Roasted GARLIC Jalapeño Sauce)
Appearance: 6/10 looks like puree peas
Taste: 7/10 garlic ( I LOVE garlic and it is a little overpowering even for me)
Heat: 6/10 out of bottle 1/10 once cooked with or added directly to food

Overall: 7/10

Lorena and Roy Marshall
The SalsaKing Fine Southwestern Foods
SalsaQueen@thehot1.com
www.thehot1.com
877-THE HOT1 (843-4681)
480-654-8407

From www.spiceburst.com
Chipotle Saltburst
Most of our ideas for new flavors come to us when we’re at home cooking or grilling. Like you, we get tired of eating the same old chicken breasts with the same old flavor, so we’re always trying to think of ways to spice things up. We like the complexity of chipotle peppers – how the flavor starts off smoky and not so hot, but then slowly intensifies. Also, we were looking for a seasoning to use instead of regular salt and pepper. After a few days in the kitchen, we created Chipotle Saltburst and its been on our dinner table ever since.

Orange Saltburst
Orange Saltburst originated from our vegetarian farmer’s market customers. They wanted a fresh, all-natural seasoning that would enhance any cooked or raw vegetable. In an all-vegetable diet, seasonings can make a huge difference in flavor. We developed the recipe for Orange Saltburst because we felt that the light and sunny flavor of citrus fruit livens up a majority of the vegetables we eat.

Chipotle Saltburst ingredients: Portuguese sea salt, roasted jalapenos (chipotles), fresh-squeezed lemon, vinegar, cilantro, and paprika

Orange Saltburst ingredients: Portuguese sea salt, orange oil, fresh-squeezed lemon, rosemary, orange zest, and paprika

I must admit I was so excited to get these salts! I love using spices and herbs to help punch up my cooking. I honestly couldn’t wait to try them but I wanted to make sure it was the right combination of flavors on all parts of the meal. So, I did what anyone who loves spices as much as I do does , I opened them and took a good whiff. First I opened the Orange Saltburst and I wasn’t disappointed with the smell. There was a wonderful smell of fresh oranges. Nothing overpowering, just delightful. Now the taste…out of this world! Just a hint of oranges with that wonderful taste and texture of a great sea salt mixed in. Now the Chipotle Saltburst held it’s own too. The smell was mouth watering! And the taste, the taste was delectable! The heat and flavor of these smoked peppers shone through with that wonderful taste and texture of the sea salt. Plus you got just the slightest taste of the lemon juice for an added boost. It wasn’t an extreme heat some might be looking for, but the taste was worth it for any chili head to give it a try!

Now, what to use them on. I didn’t want chicken again. I wanted something different. So I went to the other white meat (insert favorite joke here), pork. I pulled out some pork chops for dinner and decided to make my second favorite pork chop recipe (my first favorite way to make pork chops is just a good old box of Oven Fry for pork), Lemon Pork Chops. I figured I would use the Orange Saltburst and the Chipotle Saltburst in lieu of just my plain old Kosher salt. So I seasoned four pork chops with the Orange Saltburst and two pork chops with the Chipotle Saltburst. Then I just added the rest of the ingredients and baked. The results were breath taking! The Orange Saltburst really added a whole new dimension to the dish with the underlying tones of the orange flavor. The Chipotle Saltburst gave the pork chops a wonderful flavor of fresh smoked peppers. No major heat but wonderful flavor.

These products are just incredible! I think everyone should try them alone and in their cooking. Use them in lieu of salt when seasoning your food for the grill or the stove top. I would even use them as a finishing salt. The Orange Saltburst had no heat but the flavor is wonderful and can be spiced up with your favorite hot sauce. The Chipotle Saltburst has very little heat but again, the flavor is where it is at. You can always add your heat in other areas of your meal.

Orange Saltburst
Packaging: N/A sample containers
Aroma: 10/10 fresh oranges
Appearance: 10/10 pure beauty
Taste: 10/10 just the slightest hint of fresh oranges
Heat: 0/10
Overall: 9/10

Chipotle Saltburst:
Packaging: N/A sample containers
Aroma: 10/10 pure chipotle peppers
Appearance: 10/10 another pure beauty
Taste: 9/10 wonderful fresh smoked chipotle pepper
Heat: 4/10 perfect for novice chili heads
Overall: 9/10

Lemon Pork Chops
6 pork chops-bone in
6 thin slices of lemon or lime
6 thin slices of onion
6 tablespoons of brown sugar
6 tablespoons of ketchup
Kosher salt (this is where I put the Orange Saltburst and the Chipotle Saltburst)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place pork chops in baking dish. Season pork chops with salt (I used the Orange Saltburst and the Chipotle Saltburst instead of Kosher salt). Then place one slice of onion, one slice of lemon or lime, one tablespoon of brown sugar, and one tablespoon of ketchup on one pork chop. Repeat until all chops are covered. Cover baking dish and place in pre-heated oven for 20-30 minutes (depends on the thickness of your chops). Uncover 20-30 minutes later and baste with the juices at the bottom of the pan. Place back in oven and bake another 20-30 minutes longer (again depends on the thickness of your chops). Baste with the juices occasionally during this last stage of cooking.

Spiceburst Gourmet Spices
Austin Texas 78756
512-419-9463
www.spiceburst.com

From the bottle: “Tropical Mischief is a medium heat sauce with a hint of fruit flavor. Add Flavor and a little heat to your favorite meats, sandwiches, nachos, you name it! If you want to get even more mischievous, try it on ice cream!”

INGREDIENTS: Papaya, Guava, Pineapple, Banana, Passion Fruit, White Vinegar, Habanero Peppers, Passion and Guava Fruit Juice, Lemon Juice, Salt, Citric Acid, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C), and Beet Powder (for color)

The label on this sauce is fun. I love the angel and the devil images. It truly makes you wonder what lies ahead. The palm trees implying a taste of the tropics. Simple and complex at the same time. Very well done.

I am all about flavor in my hot sauces. The tingle from the sauce is just an added bonus in a great tasting [tag]hot sauce[/tag]. So when I got my hands on this hot sauce, I couldn’t wait to taste it! The first thing I did was open it and took a huge whiff to get a feel of what might lay in store for me. The smell was of a tropical drink. Very fruity. I didn’t smell much in the way of heat but sometimes that can be very deceiving. I knew I would have to taste it to figure out the level of heat in this mouth watering sauce.

I wanted to see the consistency and true color of Tropical Mischief. I poured into a small bowl. It is a little thinner then most hot sauces, but not runny. The color was just wonderful, a nice golden orange with flecks of the pepper and fruit floating in the sauce.

I poured a nice size amount on a spoon and tasted. It was wonderful. A little tart but these fruits usually are. I could taste all the fruit in various levels in this sauce. The heat level wasn’t there for me but would be great for a novice chili head. This is definitely a fruit lovers sauce. I could taste all the fruit in their various layers. It reminded me of the islands. It was like nothing I have ever had before.

Now for the true test, on food. I made myself a plate of cubed up left over pork cutlet, pasta, and vegetables in a garlic sauce. WOW! Very nice combination. The flavors melded so nicely. It added a whole new dimension to the meal. The only thing missing from this meal was the heat level. There just wasn’t any. I was pleasantly surprised that the tartness from the fruits were no where to be found once added to the dish.

Now I was curious about the suggestion to put it on ice cream. Hot sauce and ice cream just don’t seem a natural combination for me. But I am adventurous and willing to try new tastes at least once. So I looked in my freezer and pulled out some good old vanilla ice cream. Still hesitant, I poured the sauce on top. Well, I don’t why I was so weary, it was mind blowing. Now it tasted like a dessert sauce. No longer meant for savory meals, but sweet and fresh tasting-perfect for desserts. Still no heat but plenty of flavor.

The fruit is the main act in this sauce and you must like fruit sauces to enjoy this in your meals. There is no heat to speak of but it truly does have plenty of flavor. Also the fact that it plays as a double agent as a hot sauce and a dessert sauce is wonderful. I think everyone who likes fruit sauces should try it. You can always add heat other ways.

PACKAGING: 10/10 complex yet simple
AROMA: 10/10 fresh and fruity
APPERANCE: 8/10 a little on the thin side but beautiful color
TASTE: 10/10 fruity and tropical
HEAT: 0/10 no heat for me

OVERALL: 8/10

Mischief Makers Sauce Co.
6955 SW Nyberg St. #T203
Tualatin, OR 97062