Hot sauces discussion thread

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 8:54 pm

I'll start this pepper rolling....

I went to the store today looking for the rooster bottle hot sauce. I have heard good things about it. But they didn't have a single bottle of it. They seemed to have the normal stuff of Tabasco, Louisiana, Texas Pete and such. I really wanted something new to me so I saw Cholula. It was one I've never tried. seemed to have a good color and thickness to it in the bottle and the peppers in it sounded different too. After getting home and looking the brand and the peppers up online I think I made a good choice. Not tried it yet but have some tuna and crackers waiting for me when I do.

Is it good?

wonderpug · Post by **wonderpug** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 9:25 pm

Cholula is a good go-to hot sauce. Spicier than Tabasco and tastier, I think.

Rooster sauce is officially named "Sriracha," so be sure you're looking for the right thing. I'm surprised you can't find it since it seems like it's everywhere in American cuisine these days, but if you still have trouble you can just get it from Amazon.

Mr Bubbles · Post by **Mr Bubbles** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 9:30 pm

Cholula is a quality sauce. Good with chicken and rice, also eggs and potatoes. I enjoy the flavor much more than tapatio. If this was a random pick up, it was definitely a good run of luck.

Sudy · Post by **Sudy** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 9:30 pm

Blair's 16 Million Reserve is all I'll use.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 10:26 pm

Cholula is a great general sauce. I use it for dipping, for eggs, for chicken, all sorts of things. It has a good flavor, but it isn't so hot that it numbs your tastebuds after three bites. I get the extra large bottle and still have to replace it every month or two.

Keep looking for the cock sauce, though. Everyone seems to stock it, and it is awesome. I love it for dipping grilled chicken breasts.

RunningMn9 · Post by **RunningMn9** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 10:35 pm

I think we have different definitions for "hot".

Cholula is a great-tasting sauce for every day use. But it's not hot. I find it quite a bit more mild than Tabasco though (on par with Frank's Red Hot). When I use it, I drench the food in it. While not actually hot, it's very delicious. The rooster sauce tends to be quite a bit hotter. Also very, very good.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 10:47 pm

RunningMn9 wrote:I think we have different definitions for "hot".

Cholula is a great-tasting sauce for every day use. But it's not hot. I find it quite a bit more mild than Tabasco though (on par with Frank's Red Hot). When I use it, I drench the food in it. While not actually hot, it's very delicious. The rooster sauce tends to be quite a bit hotter. Also very, very good.

This. After reading responses I couldn't wait so i went ahead and tried it out on tuna. It has a different flavor than other hot sauces Ive ate but it's not hot. I covered my bites in it till red and it didn't burn. Tabasco is much hotter to me. I like it though. I'll keep it in my hot sauce mix. I try to take turns and try different ones as often as i can. I don't ever go through a bottle a year though. I sometimes have multiple bottles at a time of flavors.

wonderpug · Post by **wonderpug** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 11:06 pm

It's not a hot sauce, but if any of you like spicy stuff then you've got to try Deano's Jalapeno Chips. They're not jalapeno flavored potato chips; they're thinly sliced and dehydrated jalapenos with either ranch or cheddar seasoning. I picked up a bag on a whim when I was on vacation in Vermont (I guess they're made in Vermont) and they're delicious. It's spicier than pretty much any mass produced "spicy" potato or tortilla chip, but not debilitatingly spicy if you're someone who likes spiciness.

rshetts2 · Post by **rshetts2** » Mon Jul 04, 2011 11:12 pm

wonderpug wrote:It's not a hot sauce, but if any of you like spicy stuff then you've got to try Deano's Jalapeno Chips. They're not jalapeno flavored potato chips; they're thinly sliced and dehydrated jalapenos with either ranch or cheddar seasoning. I picked up a bag on a whim when I was on vacation in Vermont (I guess they're made in Vermont) and they're delicious. It's spicier than pretty much any mass produced "spicy" potato or tortilla chip, but not debilitatingly spicy if you're someone who likes spiciness.

Id like to try them out but they are not available in Michigan, they are however available in Sweeden

Hamsterball_Z · Post by **Hamsterball_Z** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 1:16 am

I like Cholula over Tabasco because it's much less vinegary. If your store sells it you might want to pick up a bottle of the Cholula Chipotle as well. I think it's a little less spicy but I love the smoky flavor.

gbasden · Post by **gbasden** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 2:03 am

Dave's Ultimate Insanity.

A group of us used to take a bottle of Ultimate Insanity down to the Mongolian BBQ place. We started with 1 drop on our food, and increased it by 1 drop each time. Bu the time we got to 14 drops we all pretty much tapped out. It was spicy enough it affected the people behind us on the grill to an extent they couldn't eat their food.

Good times.

daedalus · Post by **daedalus** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 4:12 am

as has been mentioned, cholula has nice flavour more than it is killer spicy.

srirachi, which is probably what you're looking for since that seems to be the current "in" thing, has a rooster on the bottle. there is also a more typical hot sauce called "red rooster" that is apparently good (it's what is on the table at roscoe's chicken and waffles so you know it's good!

).

there's a guy on youtube name cutlerylover who started out doing mostly knife reviews but has since started doing some hot sauce reviews which includes some of the more exotic ones found on the web. his videos might be worth a look as well if you're looking for some new ones.

Cylus Maxii · Post by **Cylus Maxii** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 9:58 am

Refresh my memory - how is Cholula compared to Tabasco Chipotle?

I haven't had Cholula in quite a while; and my daughter just broke (accidental drop) the new bottle I had purchased.

EvilHomer3k · Post by **EvilHomer3k** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 10:12 am

I use Cholula for salsa when the salsa at Mexican restaurants is too full of onion. It's not very hot but has good flavor and there is some spiciness to it. For hotness I tend to use Blair's Death Sauce. Pure death has a good amount of spiciness and is great for adding spice to other things without worrying too much that no one else will be able to eat it. Blair's has several different sauces and not all of them are super spicy.

Sriracha is pretty good as well. It's spicier than Cholula and is good to mix with other things. I have some I keep at work for adding to stuff for lunch. I'll often add it to a can of tuna or a bag of steamed rice and vegetables to give it some flavor.

RunningMn9 · Post by **RunningMn9** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 10:47 am

gbasden wrote:Dave's Ultimate Insanity.

A group of us used to take a bottle of Ultimate Insanity down to the Mongolian BBQ place. We started with 1 drop on our food, and increased it by 1 drop each time. Bu the time we got to 14 drops we all pretty much tapped out. It was spicy enough it affected the people behind us on the grill to an extent they couldn't eat their food.

Good times.

DUI is in another level. That's not something that the average Joe is going to use as hot sauce. I've had it a few times, and of all the various habanero HOT sauces, I like it the least. Da Bomb Beyond Insanity and Mad Dog 357 are much more tasty sauces. If you can stand them. Mad Dog is more than 3 times hotter than DUI.

My opinion of DUI is also sullied somewhat because the last bottle I had of it went bad I think. Most of the habanero sauces are delicious. Once this went bad, it was like putting my tongue in a molten hot vice grip. It tasted like anger.

One that I had that was positively *delicious* and that wasn't terribly hot was a scotch bonnet pepper-based sauce called "Colon Cleaner". Mmmm....

gbasden · Post by **gbasden** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 11:10 am

RunningMn9 wrote:
One that I had that was positively *delicious* and that wasn't terribly hot was a scotch bonnet pepper-based sauce called "Colon Cleaner". Mmmm....

I'll have to see if I can find that. I've really liked some of the scotch bonnet hot sauces I've tried in the past. I didn't have the problems you did with the DUI, though. I thought the taste was fine, but I'm always open to trying something better.

Tabasco and Cholula aren't hot sauces though, really. If you can bathe your food in it, it's luke-warm sauce at best.

Mr Bubbles · Post by **Mr Bubbles** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 11:19 am

Not the hottest sauce out there, but definitely hotter than Cholula, but a wonderful flavor is El Yucateco, the green sauce. It's an habanero based sauce, although it is still fairly mild, at least for my taste, if you get a chance check it out. They might not have it at local markets, but I believe you can order it online.

Blackhawk · Post by **Blackhawk** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 11:54 am

I'm always surprised at how elitist some hot sauce aficionados can come off as. I've never seen the point of a sauce that is so hot that you can't actually taste anything over the heat.

RunningMn9 · Post by **RunningMn9** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 12:38 pm

Blackhawk wrote:I'm always surprised at how elitist some hot sauce aficionados can come off as. I've never seen the point of a sauce that is so hot that you can't actually taste anything over the heat.

I don't know how many people here were talking about the hotter sauces, and indicating that they couldn't taste anything over the heat (other than my experience with a sauce that probably went bad).

My initial reaction to the OP was that the sauce he just bought was very delicious, but wasn't at all hot - an opinion that matched his experience once he tried it. There are plenty of not-hot sauces that are delicious that I use for every day sauces. I was just commenting that they aren't hot (although too much Sriracha in one dose will get you there). They are still quite good.

They just can't match the endorphin rush from ingesting Mad Dog.

LawBeefaroni · Post by **LawBeefaroni** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 12:43 pm

I'm happy with the old standbys but a new bar in our neighborhood just started carrying Firey Alyce. Last week it so happened the maker and his wife (Alyce) were both in having a beer so we got to say hello. Love supporting the local trade and it's actually good stuff.

gbasden · Post by **gbasden** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 4:38 pm

LawBeefaroni wrote:I'm happy with the old standbys but a new bar in our neighborhood just started carrying Firey Alyce. Last week it so happened the maker and his wife (Alyce) were both in having a beer so we got to say hello. Love supporting the local trade and it's actually good stuff.

That looks really good. Ordered!

wonderpug · Post by **wonderpug** » Tue Jul 05, 2011 7:17 pm

Mr Bubbles wrote:Not the hottest sauce out there, but definitely hotter than Cholula, but a wonderful flavor is El Yucateco, the green sauce. It's an habanero based sauce, although it is still fairly mild, at least for my taste, if you get a chance check it out. They might not have it at local markets, but I believe you can order it online.

I'll second El Yucateco. Very tasty, though still on the mild side.

Wargus · Post by **Wargus** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 12:15 am

DUI tops out at 90,000 scoville, try Dave's Insanity Private reserve. It is rated someplace between 300,000 & 540,000 scoville (the first is from a comparison site, the second is doing the math based on the marketing materials for it, i.e. 3x the heat of Insanity, which is rated at 180,000).

It is seriously hot. One drop will make a quart of whatever burn twice (fairly seriously twice), if you get my meaning. I put a teaspoon in a gallon of chili and nobody would eat it. I've had this stuff since 2006 and I've used less than a quarter of the bottle. The stuff is an evil looking malignant & oily red and likes to separate in the bottle. Touching the bottle means I have to wash my hands multiple times before I touch any other sensitive areas. It scares me. At one point we had a lunch room thief and I was going to put this on my sandwich just for him, but he quit before I got to it.

I also bought Blair's 4 AM Reserve, rated at 4,000,000. I had to sign a waiver saying I wouldn't sue them for misuse. I heard a bottle sold on ebay a few years ago for $5,000 US. I keep it to ward off evil spirits.

They used to up the heat every year, however have finally created Blair's 16 Million Reserve. This is as hot as it gets, it is chemically impossible to make something hotter as the bottle is filled with pure capsaicin crystal. If this doesn't count as a WMD I don't know what would.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 2:33 am

Now see Im not into the burn. I prefer flavor over pain. I like a little heat. Tabasco red is my limit on heat. But I love trying new brands for the flavors I get to experience. One of my favorites is Tabasco Green. Yesterday I picked up a jar of jalapeno disks. The first in many years. Our local Firehouse Subs has a large selection of sauces lined up along the counter in bottles. Sometimes Ill find a new one there to buy but they mainly burn and hurt so I've stopped trying them

Yog-Sothoth · Post by **Yog-Sothoth** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 8:09 am

Mr Bubbles wrote:Not the hottest sauce out there, but definitely hotter than Cholula, but a wonderful flavor is El Yucateco, the green sauce. It's an habanero based sauce, although it is still fairly mild, at least for my taste, if you get a chance check it out. They might not have it at local markets, but I believe you can order it online.

Another vote for El Yucateco green (and red). They are both good, flavorful sauces that you can actually use enough to taste. In Washington (state) you can almost always get them at Wal-Mart insanely cheaply. El Yucateco has been making sauces since 1968. They aren't part of the 'boutique' sauce craze, just an honest purveyor of honest sauces.

killbot737 · Post by **killbot737** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 8:09 am

To get WAY back to the OP, if you can't find the sriracha it's probably in your store's Asian foods section. At least that's where it is at my store, right next to the chile paste, duck sauce, etc.

And if you're a fan of hot sauce on breakfast foods (eggs and hash especially) find yourself some Tapatio! It's water based so you don't get that vinegar flavor. I think it's right around Cholula heat. I also like some Tabasco on eggs too, but sometimes it's too much when it's still bright and early. Like sriracha it may be in the Mexican section and not alongside all the other sauces.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 10:42 am

Didn't think to check the asian area. Will do next time Im in there.

RunningMn9 · Post by **RunningMn9** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 9:56 pm

In the "not too hot" department, there is a fairly lightweight scotch bonnet based sauce called Tropical Pepper Company Scotch Bonnet Carribean Pepper Sauce.

I don't know how it rates on your heat scale, but the taste is worth any extra heat than you are used to. I love this sauce.

Wargus · Post by **Wargus** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 10:59 pm

Sriracha is fantastic, if you want authentic ameri-asian hot, you use this and add hot pepper to it (the oily looking mass of hot pepper flakes you see in the little jars in the restaurants).

The perfect Pho: basic steak & brisket pho and add a generous amount of sriracha, a good squirt of plum sauce, two or three teaspoons of the hot pepper oil & flakes, jalapenos and lime.

gbasden · Post by **gbasden** » Wed Jul 06, 2011 11:58 pm

RunningMn9 wrote:In the "not too hot" department, there is a fairly lightweight scotch bonnet based sauce called Tropical Pepper Company Scotch Bonnet Carribean Pepper Sauce.

I don't know how it rates on your heat scale, but the taste is worth any extra heat than you are used to. I love this sauce.

Ordered as well. Thanks, RM9!

Debris · Post by **Debris** » Thu Jul 07, 2011 12:51 am

Tapatio is our absolute favorite sauce. It's not too hot, although it can get you if you put too much on. The flavor is second to none in my opinion. It's not a vinegar based sauce, so the flavor comes from the chilies, not the vinegar like most other sauces.

mori · Post by **mori** » Sat May 19, 2018 5:31 pm

I love Melinda's Hot Sauce because their vegetable base (carrots for the win) works extremely well with Habanero. I have only had the original previously. I tried the Secret Aardvark which has nothing to do with Melinda except it arrived at my door around the same time. So far I have not been impressed with the Aardvark with nachos or straight. Tastes like hot tomato sauce. Would be nice to spice up a pizza.

McNutt · Post by **McNutt** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:10 pm

My go to sauce is El Yucateco. Their XXX hot has a nice amount of heat. The Special Reserve has good heat and a fantastic smoked flavor. They are the best I've found and they are also dirt cheap. Under $2.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:37 pm

I guess I'm not very adventurous when it comes to hot sauces. I just buy the industrial-size Texas Pete's or Frank's or whatever's cheap and it lasts forever.

Couple of years ago the local farmers market had a hot sauce vendor who made one that I liked quite a lot, but $8 for a small bottle was excessive. She either went out of business or got too successful and moved on, because she wasn't there last year.

I've got some jalapeno-infused olive oil that I really like, but this isn't that thread.

mori · Post by **mori** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:39 pm

El Yucateco red and green sauces are a constant in my fridge. Economical, available, and full of flavor.

Brian · Post by **Brian** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:43 pm

Cholula is my regular hot sauce. Thankfully, many restaurants tend to offer it as a condiment.

If I'm at Firehouse subs I will experiment with whatever sauces they have on the counter but if it's available I always add a couple of dashes of Liquid Stoopid to my sandwhich.

For times when Cholula alone won't bring enough spice then I'll add a couple shakes of Scorpion Powder to my meal.

McNutt · Post by **McNutt** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:45 pm

Do most people keep their hot sauces in the refrigerator? Do you like it cold or is that to keep it longer?

Brian · Post by **Brian** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:51 pm

Nope. Kept on the counter.

mori · Post by **mori** » Sat May 19, 2018 6:59 pm

Most recommend refrigeration after opening.

em2nought · Post by **em2nought** » Sat May 19, 2018 7:31 pm

To someone from a Pennsylvania Dutch background in which everything should either be bland or sweet(mostly sweet), hot sauce is a Godsend. Pretty much ANY hot sauce is fine. If I'm paying more than $1 for it I might look for something with chipotle, habenero, or sriracha. Not too fond of Burman's from Aldi though.

I'm liking Sriracha ketchup lately too. No high fructose in it either.