Hot Sauce Finds: Bloodroot Mountain North County Cayenne Sauce

Bottom Line: Bloodroot Mountain North Country Cayenne Sauce delivers a well-rounded mix of tang, sweetness, and savory flavors along with a solid kick, making this one well worth adding to your hot sauce collection.

This is my latest sauce from the Heat Hot Sauce Club (more on that here), and it comes from the Vermont-based company Benito’s Hot Sauce, which has been making craft sauces since 2008. The Bloodroot Mountain North Country Cayenne Sauce (part of their Bloodroot line of specialty sauces) obviously features the chili from the title, and they claim it is the most traditional of the products they produce.

It has the tang you expect from a cayenne sauce along with a nice richness from the roasted red bell peppers. It also has a strong onion punch, but that is a good thing as it enhances the flavor instead of overwhelming the other ingredients, and it does not deliver an aftertaste. There is also a nice sweetness that is not cloying at all, and there is a hint of garlic in there, but not as much as the other two garlic-forward sauces I got in the recent box. The lime does not bring too much tang, but more of a citrus freshness, and it helps to turn this into a very well-rounded sauce.

This has a bit of a kick right away, and that goes up the more you eat, getting above Medium on my scale and coming close to their promise on the bottle of Medium Hot. This is a very good sauce and my favorite of the latest three I received, and I will almost certainly get this again and check out some of their other selections.

They suggest using it on “sunnyside eggs, taylor ham sandwiches, egg rolls and pork enchiladas,” which are some pretty specific recommendations (Taylor Ham is an East Coast specialty that comes out of New Jersey). I don’t disagree with any of those options, and I think it would also work well as a marinade for chicken breast that you then throw on the grill (and have the bottle ready for a few extra spritzes when you serve it).

You can buy this directly from the Benito’s Hot Sauce website, and you can also get it from HeatHotSauce.com. It is $7.89 at the former (a heck of a deal for a craft sauce like this) and $9.99 at the latter, though you will pay shipping unless you meet the minimum order threshold. I really like this sauce and highly recommend it, and I will be looking forward to trying more from this company.

Nutrition Info:

Ingredients: Cayenne Peppers, Fire Roasted Red Bell Peppers, Organic Garlic Powder, Onions, Organic Lime Juice, Organic White Vinegar, Sea Salt.

Serving Size: 1 tspn (6g)
Calories: 2
Fat: 0g (0g Sat/0 Trans)
Protein: 0g
Carbs: 0g
Sodium: 100mg