Review - Duke and Baron's All-American Diablo Verde
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I've been really digging on some spectacular green sauces lately. In my opinion, the salsa verde sub-genre is one of the most underrated in the world of condiments and food enhancers.
Diablo Verde is yet another entry in this type of hot sauce. It is produced by Duke & Baron's All American, a gourmet specialty foods company that uses only organic, whole food ingredients. The company was formed by a few friends who share a love for great food and wanted to do something to show our appreciation for the brave men and women who defend our great country. How do they do this? Well, for every product you purchase from Duke & Baron's All American, they will donate a product to both active and inactive U.S. military personnel.
Duke & Baron's All American has an expanding line of products which include hot sauces, BBQ sauces, rubs and marinades. They obviously support a great cause, but can they produce a great product? Jim Lemkin of Duke & Baron's sent me a few bottles of Diablo Verde to see if it indeed belongs among all the other excellent green sauces I've been trying lately.
Ingredients:
White Wine Vinegar, Pasilla peppers, Hatch Chiles, Roasted Shallots, Roasted Garlic, Roasted Serrano Peppers, Vodka, Bhut Jolokia Peppers, Lime juice, various herbs and spices.
Aroma:
3 out of 5. A really light, fragrant blend of chiles, vinegar and onion-like tones. Even for a green sauce, it's a little different, and has none of that "knock you out" kind of hot sauce smell.
Appearance and Texture:
3 out of 5. A beautiful mixture of light greens, dark greens, whites and dark spices. I like my hot sauces a bit on the thick sauce, and Diablo Verde is as dense as many salsas are. Maybe a bit too thick, as the sauce clogs up the bottleneck, and requires a few gentle whaps to get the stuff back down into the bottle after pouring.
Taste Straight Up:
3.5 out of 5. Good stuff! There's a rich complexity that I really dig. The flavor pops thanks to the employment of the lower-heat chiles. The high notes of tart vinegar and a low-medium spiciness peak through, but it's really the taste of the roasted chile peppers, the tiny bit of sweetness from the lime juice and the shallots and garlic. I honestly could not detect vodka, so apparently that takes a very subdued supporting role in the overall flavor. And the bhut jolokia? I could not tell any ghost chile was in this, neither from the taste nor the heat.
Taste on Food:
4 out of 5. I placed some Diablo Verde on some seasoned, oven-baked Tilapia. This stuff was on the mark! There was wonderful boldness that intermingled with the light qualities of the flaky fish without being overpowering. Nice job, Jim.
Heat:
2 out of 5. This possesses a tolerable amount of heat for most fans of green sauces, yet is certainly a well above "mild" level that many green sauces that contain jalapeno have (just as a comparison). To reiterate, I could not tell that any bhut jolokia was in this.
Label:
3 out of 5. I admire what Jim was doing here. A picture of the two dogs - Duke and Baron - adorn the middle with the name brand of "Duke & Baron's All American" surrounding it, and the background uses the modern army "pixelated" camouflage pattern. But there is no indication of what this product is, what is inside of the bottle ingredients-wise or even what the name of the sauce is. The only other thing in this is "DV", short for Diablo Verde, of course. In Jim's defense, there is more info on the back of the label.
Overview:
Duke and Baron's is doing a great thing here. Even if this sauce tasted like crap, I would still suggest that you pick up a bottle to help out our troops and vets. But since this is a worthy sauce, it's a total no-brainer!
Purchase a bottle or two over at http://www.dukeandbarons.com.
Comments
2012-04-09 09:17:42
2012-04-09 10:25:31
2012-04-09 11:18:20
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