Review - Bacon Hot Sauce
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Resigning to the fact that this bacon trend is not over, I knew it would only be a matter of time before the popular pork product would be making the inroads towards the hot sauce realm. I heard of the development of this last Autumn here in the States, and now Bacon Hot Sauce is here in 2010. Even if I believe the whole fad is egregiously over-hyped, I'm willing to give just about any sauce a fair shake. If it's pulled off correctly its maker could have a hit on their hands and justify the hype. Pete of Bacon Hot Sauce generously lent me a bottle of his creation to get my take on it...
Ingredients:
Water, Distilled Vinegar, Cayenne Pepper, New Mexico Chili, Salt, Natural Flavor, Maltodextrin, Autolyzed Yeast Extract, Xanthan Gum, Sodium Benzoate, Potassium Sorbate (preservatives)
Label:
5 out of 5. Nicely designed. A porcine specimen is sweating profusely, has smoke shooting out of his ears and flames lapping out of his mouth. Just by this graphic visual alone, I would probably pick up a bottle of this in a store.
Aroma:
2.5 out of 5. The scent is like a vague mishmash of Bac-Os, liquid smoke, barbecue sauce.
Appearance and Texture:
3.5 out of 5. The consistency ain't too bad. Neither thin nor thick, this flows nicely out of the bottle and you'll find yourself able to pour it around your food with little difficulty. It has a decent red color, contains tiny red specks and is moderately appetizing.
Taste Straight Up:
2 out of 5. It was time to see what Bacon Hot Sauce brought to the table. I trickled out a spoonful and placed it in my mouth. There was nothing about the smell that screams loudly "hot sauce" or "fresh-cooked bacon" to me. It was a heavy, nearly gritty and almost "oily" feel on my tongue. It seemed like the bulk and creaminess of Bacon Hot Sauce consisted of lots of dried chile powder minus the flavor or heat of chile peppers. This also had negligible bacon flavor. I detected tartness from vinegar coming up in the back-end but this all did not blend together adequately, let alone deliciously.
Taste on Food:
1.5 out of 5. I didn't want to give up on this yet, as not every sauce will stand up on its own and may require food to really help it bring out its "A-game".
I gave a cheeseburger with dill pickle slices a heavy helping of Bacon Hot Sauce and hoped it would provide a spicy kick and a nice hint of bacon. It supplied neither one of those attributes. I found that Bacon Hot Sauce got squished and buried in the flavor mix. Even the bites with the thickest amount of sauce barely registered on the taste-o-meter. There were times that it didn't even seem like a condiment was on the burger.
I subsequently applied Bacon Hot Sauce to other foods: fried chicken, eggs, and a baked potato with butter and cheddar cheese. Again, this liquid seemed too muted to trigger the taste buds and quite frankly, the aforementioned foods tasted better on their own.
Heat:
A letdown here. Unless you think the vinegar-induced tartness (similar to a Tabasco) is flaming, this wouldn't have much of a burn to you at all. 1 on a scale of 1 to 5.
Overall:
This is a big disappointment. It lacked a real, cohesive bacon flavor and was simply missing any semblance of a strong taste or identity. I would suggest the makers of this to scrap this formula and try again at creating a good, basic hot sauce, and one with palpable bacon flavor at that.
In the meantime, if you're craving a condiment with a killer bacon presence, give Captain Thom's Slappin' Fat Bacon Ketchup a try. Sure, it may be lacking heat and bluster of a hot sauce, but at least you get a terrific, rich ketchup flavor along with a nice, complementary salted & cured pork savoriness.
Bacon Hot Sauce comes in a standard 5 oz. woozy bottle and is available at baconhotsauce.com for $5.99 a pop plus shipping.
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