Tahiti Joe- Ahi of Kahuna XX Hot Sauce with cheese
Bottle Description: One day while Tahiti Joe was cooling under a coconut palm, he heard voices in his head: his tastebuds were talking to him. They wanted him to make a sauce so “hot” and flavorful, it would please any chilihead’s addiction for heat, and the tastebuds wanted it with cheese. So Tahiti Joe asked the great Polynesian Fire God for help, and at the urging of Tahiti Joe’s kahine (sister) Kimblalayawanalaya, Tahiti Joe gives you “Ahi of Kahuna XX Hot Sauce with Cheese” (her favorite sauce). Warning! 4 out of 5 proctologists recommend not to use this sauce. The 5th is a chilihead!
Ingredients: Aged red peppers, red wine vinegar, concentrated vegetables juices, Worcestershire, Honey, Key Lime Juice, clam juice, parmesan cheese, romano cheese, fresh carrots, fresh garlic in water, fresh habaneros, fresh onions, spices
Container: Sticks to the Tahiti motif, the character on the label has a chin that could crush a Buick.
Appearance: Amber brown with a lot of chunks. Pepper skins, seeds, cheese and a whole lot of other solids. A chunky chunky sauce.
Smell: This sauce smells exactly like a pizza with hot sauce on it. The pizza part must be from the cheese and the hot sauce scent is comprised of predominantly habanero and peppers aromas. Vinegar is NOT a major issue with this sauce and the other spices come out very nicely.
Taste: The beginning of the flavors is a habanero strong hot sauce flavor that is quite delicious. Imagine your average habanero sauce then up the habanero and keep the vinegar down. There’s a hint of sweetness after the habanero flavor. This alone would have been a fantastic sauce but in addition you get a delicious cheese flavor. This adds a lot of the saltiness of the sauce and gives the sauce a really fat flavorful ending. You can differentiate the two phases of the sauce but if you try hard enough but they blend together well. The spices are in their right places and they help to add to the flavor, neither distracting from the cheese nor the habanero. Imagine a roller coaster where there is no going up part and all you get is the thrill of the freefall.
Heat: (8.0/10) You’d think a sauce with cheese in it would be mild but no this sauce is quite hot. I usually test hot sauces by swigging them out of a bottle. I had to do this very carefully with this sauce, tipping it very slowly. Not for noobies.
Field Test: This is an all purpose sauce of the best variety. It goes well on pretty much everything. That being said, this sauce is very flavor heavy and if you are trying to preserve the taste of a delicate food then this sauce would completely dominate it. However if your aim is to enhance your food then this sauce is utterly fantastic. OR, crack this baby open and just swig it, it’s still delicious.
Final Word: It has got to be the cheese but this sauce is one of the few sauces that has really really caught my attention in the last couple of months. Go buy it now.
Overall: 10/10
Tahiti’s Hot Sauces
Joe & Charlotte Turner
(561) 439 – 7832
Fax (561) 965 – 4909
4310 State Drive
West Palm Beach, FL 33406