Three New Fruit Hot Sauces from Maui Pepper Company

Strawberry Meltdown Hot Sauce

While hot sauces flavored with fruit have been around for some time now, most fruit hot sauces rely almost exclusively on tropical fruits like mango, papaya, different varieties of citrus (lemon, lime, orange and even grapefruit), and pineapple. Also popular are peaches and apricots. And for the sake of this post, I'm not including tomatoes even though technically they're fruit.

Once in a while we run into an unusual (for hot sauce) fruit playing a starring role in a hot sauce, such as apple (featured in Maui Pepper Co. Apples Ass Hot Sauce) or cranberry (in the award-winning Toad Sweat Cranberry Dessert Sauce). The following three new hot sauces fall into this category, as each uses one or more different berries to provide lusciously summer-sweet, ripe & juicy flavor that delightfully complement the hot peppers for a refreshingly creative taste experience.  All three are made by Maui Pepper Company, and are now available on the Carolina Sauces online store.

The first of the bunch is the "tamest" and is called Strawberry Meltdown Hot Sauce, a bright and sassy concoction of juicy strawberries and fiery habanero peppers in a honey-sweetened apple juice & vinegar base. The flavor is enticing and inviting, not quite delicate but gentle enough for use on the mildest of foods including fish and shellfish, pork loin and poultry for pleasantly piquant spice and sunny strawberry flavor. As with the Toad Sweat hot sauces, Strawberry Meltdown is terrific on desserts such as cheesecake, bread pudding, chocolate or vanilla ice cream, or even on biscuits, pancakes, hot oatmeal and other breakfast fare. One taste and you'll wonder why you never thought of combining strawberries with chili peppers!

Chipotle Raspberry Mango Hot Sauce

In contrast to the light, bright flavor of the previous sauce, Chipotle Raspberry Mango Hot Sauce is firmly grounded in deep, earthy, smoky and complex flavors, but with enough ripe raspberry sweetness to keep this sauce from getting too "heavy" or "dark." In addition to providing a robust smokiness to this singular hot sauce, the chipotles add a good amount of heat--and there are also habanero peppers in the mix--making this fruity-smoky hot sauce an excellent choice for heartier foods including anything grilled, plus roast beef or turkey, all sorts of sausages, and even burgers and steak. It's outrageously good with smoked ribs, and it's divine on veggie burgers instead of ketchup, too. For a quick appetizer or snack, blend some of this hot sauce into softened cream cheese and spread on crackers or pita chips, a bagel, or even some toast. Boost the flavor by mixing a few splashes into your favorite chicken salad or turkey salad recipe.

Berry Mangolo Hot Sauce

Last but certainly not least is the amusingly-named Berry Mangolo Mango Habanero Hot Sauce (this one makes a great gift for a chilehead who appreciates silly puns). Each release of this berry-loaded hot sauce is slightly different than the previous, because the combination of berries used will vary with what's in season and best at the time each batch is made. But the common threads are that each batch begins with Maui Pepper Company's famous mango-habanero hot sauce base, and each batch will include three different types of berries selected from the following possible choices: Strawberry, blueberry, blackberry, red raspberry, boysenberry and marionberry. How's that for berry-licious variety?

Berry Mangolo falls between the other two berry hot sauces in terms of heat and "bigness" of flavor, making it quite possibly the most versatile and food-friendly of the bunch. Like Strawberry Meltdown, you can enjoy this sweet and fruity hot sauce on ice cream, cheesecake and other desserts; over waffles, pancakes, French toast and other breakfast items; with grilled, roasted, broiled or baked meats, poultry and seafood; and in dips, salads and other recipes when you're feeling adventurous.

You'll find these and other fruity hot sauces, as well as more traditional savory and tangy hot sauces, on sale at the Carolina Sauce Company.

Zestfully yours,
Gloria