I usually do not buy just anything that has “Habanero” in its name, especially when I’m at the grocery store. But, I’ll be honest, this was on sale, so I took a look. It’s made in Wisconsin (my bland home state), and my family and I took a visit to the Mustard Capital in Mount Horeb (WI), so, what the hey, why not???
Ingredients: Distilled vinegar, Water, Ground Mustard Seed, green chili peppers, Habanero Peppers, salt, Paprika, spices, dehydrated garlic, calcium chloride, sodium benzoate (preservative).
Essentially, by looking at this list, this is basically a grain mustard with chiles added. I poured some on my trusty tasting spoon, took a whiff, and smelled”¦..mustard. Just regular mustard. I took another look at it: no visible pieces of chiles, no seeds. I took one more sniff and LO AND BEHOLD! All I got was plain mustard. Habanero mustard my !**!
Then I took the taste. Yeah, mustard, and then out of the blue: POW! It hits you blind-sided. The heat didn’t really stick around, but what it did do was accentuate the clean flavor of the grain mustard. I was really taken aback-this was some pretty decent mustard!
I needed a food item that was truly made to pair with this, so I started with the standard pretzels. I bought pretzel sticks (dipping kind), gave a handful to my two year old daughter, and went to town. And I gotta say: pretty good. The saltiness of the pretzels complimented the saltiness and vinegar of the mustard while bringing out the crisp taste of the mustard grain. Then I took it to a hallowed Wisconsin tradition, an institution so sacred that the mere mention of it brings awe and confusion to those outside of this fine mid-west state. Yes my dear friends, I’m talking about: The Bratwurst. Yes, the fat little sausage that German immigrants made this region famous for. Famous if you’re a Wisconsinite, I guess.
Anyway, I grilled off some fresh brats, sautéed some onions, and put it all together. In a word: Divine. The fattiness of the brat and onions played well against the sharp mustard/habanero contrast, all the while without losing too much heat from the chile duo. This stuff was really going down well, so I cooked off another brat for a friend of mine, didn’t tell him about the mustard, and just watched him eat. My friend isn’t a chile head, so after a few choice words and gulps of drink, I concluded that to the uninitiated, this mustard delivers what it says.
So let’s get to my Five Points Scale:
Appearance: 3. This is a mustard first, and there would be no warning if you didn’t know there were chiles in here. Ask my friend!
Smell: Again a 3. See above.
Flavor: I’m going to give this a solid 4, only because-again-this is a mustard first with chiles added. The habanero adds secondary notes, and is not the main star in this. But a great, clean mustard flavor.
Heat:4.5. This mustard was made for the masses looking to spice things up a little. For the masses, this wouldn’t spice things up, it would blow things up.
Overall: 3.75. This is a really good mustard (and remember, mustard is a sauce). Silver Spring Gardens did what they intended to do-for regular folks. For the rest of us, this would be a slightly spicier mustard, which I like every now and then. Try it with fatty sausages, cheeses, and especially cold-cut sandwiches.
Until next time, treat every meal like it was your last!
Silver Spring Gardens, Inc.
Eau Claire, WI 54701-0360
www.silverspringfoods.com