I have come to the conclusion that Mexican Hot Sauces come in two categories. Incredible or Awful. There was some trepidation in opening up this one as Nick had mentioned he had picked up a few sauces at convenience stores during his vacation in California. I received a pretty good bunch of sauces and I saw something among the bottles of his travels that would discern in which category of Incredible and awful a sauce would fit in. It may be stereotyping but there is a definite pattern here and if you follow my next few reviews of these sauces you will see what I mean.

I hold El Yucateco as the stalwart of Mexican Sauces. It is just really good and it is always my reference point when reviewing these types of sauces. I saw some similarities between this one and El Yucateco. It had a good label, nutritional information an over all care for how it looked. The manufacturers of this apparently care about their product.

Ingredients: Habanero Peppers, Salt, Spices, Xanthan Gum, Vinegar, Sodium Benzoate as a preservative it may contain some of these colours, Yellow colour FD&C No5, Yellow Colour FD&C No6, Red Colour FD&C No 40.

I didn’t get too much in terms or aroma. The lid limiter made sure of that. A look at the ingredients made it apparent that I wasn’t getting in over my head with anything here so I liberally splashed it onto my plate to accompany some chicken I made.

The sauce looks fabulous. It is bright and fresh and almost velvety in texture. There are no visible pieces and I think it would be better off they removed the stopper as the sauce is thick enough to be free poured and I didn’t even have it in fridge prior to trying it.

The taste is what I expected and what I was craving for. It was a brilliant splash of moderate heat and a fresh habanero taste without too much vinegar interference. The heat was impressive for a sauce that didn’t tout itself as being really hot. Don’t get me wrong it isn’t a scorcher but this would make a damn fine table sauce for all occasions.

If you see this in your local store make sure to give it a try!

Packaging 7/10
Aroma 5/10
Appearance 9/10
Taste 9/10
Heat 6/10

Overall 8.8/10

Packed By: Salsa Castillo
Hermosillo, Sonora, Mex 83290
Tel: (662) 251-05-19
Fax (662) 251-05-58
www.salsacastillo.com