The Gar-Banero is a lively, red-colored sauce with a very smooth texture, a few seeds floating around, and an easy to pour consistency which sticks to food very well. The aroma is of garlic and vinegar. The label reads, “Super Hot Habs meet with kickin’ roasted garlic and shallots to make this flavorful and punishing sauce.”
Ingredients: Red Habaneros, vinegar, water, onions, garlic, carrots, shallots, sugar, salt, herbs.
On First Taste
The flavor of the Gar-Banero hot sauce is an evenly balanced blend of garlic, vinegar, and pepper taste. The vinegar is plentiful but well used, and plays well with the roasty flavors. The taste is much more comprehensive than a typical red vinegar sauce; the whole amalgamation come off with a single, bold flavor rather than as isolated components. Enjoying the flavor, I doused a cracker with a decent sized puddle and downed it.
A few seconds after that hit my tongue, the true nature of the Gar-Banero was unleashed. A significant and completely unexpected fire erupted in my mouth. It was similar to the heat you get from an extract sauce, or from eating a very small piece of a habanero directly - a veritable kick in the mouth. In fact, the heat was so high that it made me forget about the flavors all together.
Heat Analysis
After letting my tongue cool down for a while, and still in a bit of shock about the wallop this non-extract sauce packed, I was curious to test exactly how hot the Gar-Banero was. Since I don’t have an HPLC machine on hand, I tried to compare it to known quantities. Which means, it’s just my perception of how hot the sauce is relative to others, and may not necessarily indicate the real Scoville rating of the sauce. That disclaimer aside, I began by taking a drop of Endorphin Rush (mild extract sauce, 33,000 SHU) and letting it burn out - about 1.5 minutes. Then, a drop of Blair’s After Death (50,000 SHU) and let that burn out, about 4 minutes. Finally, I tried an equal sized drop of the Gar-Banero; I did that one last to make sure that any tolerance I was building up worked against the Gar-Banero, since I didn’t want to overstate it’s heat.
The Gar-Banero took just under 3 minutes to burn out. Furthermore, it was a far sharper, more potent heat than the Endorphin rush. It was not as intense as the After Death, but it wasn’t far behind. No doubt about it, this sauce is a legitimate scorcher hiding in the innocence of a red vinegar sauce!
On Food
For my repertoire, red vinegar sauces are a bit limited by nature. But I do quite enjoy them on breakfast food. So, I took the wife out to breakfast to put the Gar-Banero through it’s paces. I used the sauce on a tomato, onion, mushroom and cheese omelet and on sausage links on the side. The Gar-Banero performed extremely well, and had me in a full forehead mist by the end of the meal.
In Conclusion:
Although a bit limited in use by nature and by the high heat level, Capitol Punishment’s Red Roasted Gar-Banero is a very good hot sauce. If you’re looking for a good tasting red vinegar sauce that packs one hell of a punch, then the Gar-Banero is for you. Chef Gordon has definitely come up with the answer to the boring, run of the mill red vinegar sauce - you won’t be disappointed.
Overall Rating:
To do this sauce justice, I’m breaking out of my typical rating scale into 2 components, heat and flavor which are combined for the overall rating.
Heat: 9.6 out of 10
Flavor: 8.0 out of 10
Overall: 8.8 out of 10
Tags: hot sauceChilehead Comments:
Posted by: John - Categories: Uncategorized
Permalink: Review: Capitol Punishment’s Red Roasted Gar-Banero Hot Sauce
One year ago: Restaurant Review: Dinosaur BBQ Redux
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24 Comments »
Nice job John! This has become a flagship of the line for Cap.Heads. I did a show on Saturday and sold out of the Garbanero in a few hours. It’s really popular for the HEAT and Flavor combo, as you said it can hold it’s own for shear power (except the real weapons grade capsicum stuff), and part of the reason for roasting the garlic, shallots, viadillia onions, was to highten thier flavors and draw out natural sweetness.
Mix with melted butter and becomes a good wing sauce too!
Jim,
Point well taken. I will repeat the effort in the reverse order, to see how that changes things. I just waited until the burning faded to move onto the next drop; I’ll keep that consistent.
Jim,
Point well taken. I will repeat the effort in the reverse order, to see how that changes things. I just waited until the burning faded to move onto the next drop; I’ll keep that consistent.
Gordon,
Glad you liked the review! Your sauces have the great ability to get me to enjoy styles I typically would pass over.
John S. on 5/24/2006 at 12:54 pm said:
Gordon,
Glad you liked the review! Your sauces have the great ability to get me to enjoy styles I typically would pass over.
What styles do you normally go after?
John S. on 5/24/2006 at 12:53 pm said:
Jim,
Point well taken. I will repeat the effort in the reverse order, to see how that changes things. I just waited until the burning faded to move onto the next drop; I’ll keep that consistent.
Didn’t want to come across as nit picking 
I think in the original Scoville testing, panel members were limited in the number of tests they could do in a given time and had quite a lengthy recovery period in between so as to not ‘color’ the tests from one to the next.
I’m willing to bet though, it’s still plenty hot 
Again- nice review!
Go G man… Im going to have to get me some of that
Thanks Lisa, We’ll meet half way. Say Deleware. Trade ya for a “Rub me”.
Gordon on 5/24/2006 at 3:01 pm said:
Thanks Lisa, We’ll meet half way. Say Deleware. Trade ya for a “Rub me”.
Man, that just doesn’t sound right. LOL!
Is there someone that people are already using for Liquid Chromatography tests? The Garbanero is one I would be curious about.
Gordon,
I typically go for thick, chunky styles that have one of two qualities: unusual ingredients that make for exciting culinary adventures, or simpler mash type sauces that taste like raw peppers. And, my favorite flavor profiles tend to include garlic, smoke and roasty notes.
I also do like the extract class, though it’s a completely different feeling. I like the raw heat of a 500,000+SHU sauce even though it doesn’t do much for taste; I usually eat those on chips only for the burn since they ruin food.
I usually avoid red vinegar sauces, tomatillo based sauces, and overly processed sauces (with the exception of El Yucatco - highly processed but wonderfully delicious.) I think the reason I usually don’t like them is that they are out of whack, flavorwise. That’s probably why I really liked your sauces so much. They were so well crafted - finely balanced, good heat levels, and imaginative and well implemented ingredient choices.
I think I mentioned to you that I like the natural wine movement - bringing the drinker closer to the fruit, almost like they are in the vineyard. Picking ingredients that complement each other, and let the whole flavor shine. To me, your products are the hot sauce equivalent of that. Natural, fresh tasting, well balanced, with a finely crafted flavor profile that brings the eater very close to the raw ingredients.
Nice review! Looks like it might be out of my league though.
eman on 5/24/2006 at 6:16 pm said:
Nice review! Looks like it might be out of my league though.
I’m sure you could do a good review too, eman!
jim campbell- StepUpForCharity.org on 5/24/2006 at 6:38 pm said:
I’m sure you could do a good review too, eman!
no, I mean hotness wise. I have found that my tollerance is much lower than most of the poeple on here.
eman on 5/24/2006 at 7:13 pm said:
no, I mean hotness wise. I have found that my tollerance is much lower than most of the poeple on here.
I knew what you meant 
My tolerance isn’t all that great either as CaJohn likes to point out every now and then Except for extracts.
eman on 5/24/2006 at 7:13 pm said:
no, I mean hotness wise. I have found that my tollerance is much lower than most of the poeple on here.
“no, I mean hotness wise.”
I think you’re pretty HOT eman…
jim campbell- StepUpForCharity.org on 5/24/2006 at 7:22 pm said:
I knew what you meant
just making sure
Vic on 5/24/2006 at 7:23 pm said:
“no, I mean hotness wise.”
I think you’re pretty HOT eman…
thanks, i try. It’s hard to be gorgeous
eman on 5/24/2006 at 7:31 pm said:
just making sure
thanks, i try. It’s hard to be gorgeous
I hear you, I get so tired of telling people “Dont hate my because I am beautiful” It’s a burdon I have come to live with, let me tell you it’s not easy. LOL yeah right! 
. 
Mrs.Ryan on 5/24/2006 at 7:43 pm said:
.
Ok- easy, don’t go there. Just jokes lol
LOL no no no i am just playin
FYI, I tried tasting the three sauces in the opposite order: Garbanero, Endorphin rush, then After Death.
This time the Garbanero and Endorphin rush both burner about 2.5 mintutes, and seemed just about the same heat to me. The After death was still pretty close to four minutes to burn out, and was clearly the hottest to my taste.
I wouldn’t have thought it, but your sensitizer theory seems to be right, Jim.
Re: I wouldn’t have thought it, but your sensitizer theory seems to be right, Jim.
I’m not a real chile pepper expert- I just play one on TV Still, your results aren’t all that much different- After Death is still the hottest & Gar-banero still hurts
I appreciate your sacrifices in the interest of science
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Nice review John! While I understand what you were trying to accomplish with measuring it against other sauces, Capsaicin can actually work as a bit of a sensitizer as well, and it’s effect is cumulative, up to a certain dose. This effect, familiar to us as ‘the more I ate the hotter it got’, is especially true of habs. How much time did you give between each drop?
Like you, while this was one of my favorite flavors (#2 behind the Sear Acha), the heat was a bit on the upper end of tolerance