1st Hot Sauce Tasting, Pepper North

First Hot Sauce Tasting, Mostly Pepper North (August 12th, 2022)

This was our 1st “Hot Sauce” Tasting.  We had 10 invitees originally, but due to 2 last minute cancellations we ended up with 8.  There were 6 participants who made it all the way to the end, and 2 who tapped out rather quickly at round 1, and 2.  The individuals who tapped out early, did enjoy watching the others “animated reactions” in the later rounds.  They also talked big, and offered up some “peer pressure” which was interesting, considering how early they themselves had tapped out.  But anyway, the bottles in question were ;

PN* = Pepper North

This tasting was inspired by the Youtube show “Hot Ones”.  I chose Pepper North for our 1st tasting, since it was featured in “Hot Ones”, it was Sauce #7, on Season 11.  Pepper North’s hottest sauce was a decent 118,000 SHU, which seemed “reasonable”, to me, the “Hot One’s” Sauce #10 that season was 2,000,000 SHU, which doesn’t seem reasonable to me, for one’s palette.  Pepper North has a full line of sauces, with their hottest being 118,000 SHU, I’m trying to have at least 8 sauces/bottles from the same maker, and then fill in the line, if necessary, to even out the increase of the SHU, if I can.  My goal is 10 sauces per tasting.  I added High River’s Hellacious Hot sauce, at #6, based on reviews it seems to be 50,000 SHU, and I added Dawson’s Original Hot Sauce, at #9 with 82,000 SHU (featured in “Hot Ones”, Season 5, Sauce #7).

So we tasted all the hot sauces on chicken wings, although Maria opted for pizza, instead of chicken wings.  All sauces were rated on a scale of 1-10 on taste, and 1-10 on heat.   We also did 2 bonus hot sauces, Torchbearer’s Zombie Apocalypse and Dave’s Gourmet Insanity Sauce (formerly the hottest sauce in the world).

The first two rounds, surprisingly had 2 participants tap out, and disqualify themselves, my lips weren’t even burning yet, and I’d consider myself a pansy for hot sauces, so that definitely caught me off guard.  The next person to “tap out”, was Alisha at round 8, which to me was respectable.  “Tap Out” within this context means have milk, to stem the heat.  Alisha did continue up to round 10 though, so she was a trouper.  I “tapped out” at round 10, but went to round 12.  Terri tapped out at Round 12, in a very “animated” fashion, trying to bathe her tongue in milk, she also gave it a white claw bath.  Maria quietly stopped at round 9, she never required milk though.  There were 2 who went right to round 12, without any milk, without any “tapping out”, and that was Adam, and Sylwester.  Bravo guys, truly bravo!!  Sylwester skipped round 11 though, Adam missed round #1, due to timing, if I was to pick a winner, I’d say Adam, but I have no doubt Sylwester could have easily beat/had round 11, not sure why he didn’t do that round.

I made the “Zombie Apocalypse” a bonus sauce because the Scoville rating, SHU, seemed to be under debate, the “Hot Ones” website said it was 100,000 SHU, while the Torchbearer website, the maker of the sauce, had it at 500,000 SHU.  That is a wide gap, and since it was our 1st ever hot sauce tasting, I didn’t want to truly hurt anyone, so I made it a optional bonus round.  The group that tasted it, agrees that 100,000 is more in the range of the SHU, it’s no where close to 500,000 SHU.

Dave’s Gourmet Insanity sauce, the 2nd bonus sauce, we all knew was going to be hot, it’s made with extract, so that means it’ll normally be hotter than its SHU rating, and its SHU was already 180,000 SHU.  This sauce burns for 5 minutes.  It is HOT!!  Hat’s off to Adam and Sylwester who suffered quietly.

So some interesting stats.  The clear winner on taste was sauce #8, Penny North’s Momento de Muerte, which is made with Blackcherry and Reaper Pepper.  It’s actually been renamed “Blackcherry and Reaper”.  Almost everyone (except Maria), gave it their highest rating for taste.   It ended up with a 7.7 for taste.  The lowest one on taste was Dave’s Gourmet Insanity Sauce, and in the regular rounds, was Penny North Salsa Raja & Ghost, sauce #5, all were in agreement at it being lowest, again except for Maria (no issue, everyone’s tastes are different), it ended up with a 4/10 for taste.

In terms of Heat, to no ones surprise Dave’s Gourmet “Insanity” Sauce, was the hottest.  What was interesting was Sauce #8, Pepper North’s Momento de Muerte, came out as hot as Dawson’s Original Hot Sauce which is 82,000 SHU vs 66,000 SHU, and hotter than Zombie Apocalypse, but Zombie was done with a much smaller sample, but Zombie is supposedly 100,000 SHU.  I’d say one that didn’t do well is Pepper North Salsa Raja & Ghost, Sauce #5, it was the lowest on taste, and was very low on heat, compared to its SHU rating.

So what did I learn, I think 100,000-120,000 is the top of my comfort zone, I wouldn’t mind doing a tasting of 10 sauces all around that level.  I also have to figure out a better way to dole out the wings.  I’m sure it won’t surprise you, those who know me, that I have all 18 seasons of Hot One’s Sauces in a spreadsheet with the Scoville, the season they’re from, and how much they are…$$, for future tastings.

All sauces were Canadian, except for High River’s Hellacious Hot Sauce.

In terms of trends within the votes, and interesting facts, you can tell Alisha (avg 4.2)  and Sylwester (avg 4.1) are harsh critics, Maria (avg 7.8) is very optimistic, or just really likes all hot sauces.

Pizza, Chicken Wings, Nata’s and Apple Pie (ty Alishia) were served to all participants.

The tasting went from 6:00pm to 8:30pm, and it was done ‘live’, no remote participants.

I look forward to the next one, I hope everyone had fun!

The Winners!

1st place “Taste” (7.7 $9)

1st Place “Heat” (10.8 $12)

Overall Winner

The next hot sauce tasting is Aubrey D, the “Rebel” line.

Let me know, if you’re in!

The Survey Results

² I checked the underlying data, they are the same ratings, its not a typo, or copy/paste issue.