I met the folks at Redd-Eye Brand during the Jungle Jim’s weekend and loved all their products. I felt really bad because they had sent some products to us before and we hadn’t had a chance to review them. I think at this point, all of our writers are just swamped like crazy with many more bottles on the shelf waiting than there used to be. So, we’re going to do a bit more work to catch up. Anyway, their products were so good that I just couldn’t let this go any further.

Now, most of you know I’m a medium kind of girl. I like habanero flavor and heat, but not as my every day/all day condiment. But what you may not know is that I like things that start medium but finish hot, hot, hot. It’s kind of like getting a bonus gift for playing. You know? That’s exactly how I think of this “Eye Poppin Hot” salsa…a bonus gift.

Ingredients: tomatoes (diced tomatoes, tomato juice, salt, sodium chloride, and citric acid), fresh habaneros, red onions, cilantro, vinegar, lime juice, sea salt, garlic, mexican oregano, cumin & sugar

First Impression: Very, very fresh. In my opinion, it is highly difficult to make a shelf salsa taste fresh. This is one of the few on the market. More importantly, and on a similar matter, it is infinitely difficult to maintain cilantro flavor in a shelf salsa. These folks seem to do a great job of pulling out natural flavors into an outstanding chip salsa that is shelf stable.

Taste: Starts out sweet. Then it moves on to tasting individual elements like the cumin (you can taste that immediately) and the cilantro. Again, for a shelf stable product, this has an awesome cilantro flavor. Now for the surprise part…BEWARE…this salsa catches up. There are DEFINITELY habaneros in this puppy. But the great thing is that you can be eating this for a while and not really get it until you stop. Then you’re like, “Whoa…this salsa has kick!” It’s a great experience.

Overall Recommendation: I love the “catch up” aspect of this salsa. That combined with the fresh taste and myriad of flavors makes this a wonderful chip salsa. You could use it for anything you would use salsa, but it’s just a lot of fun to eat very plainly on its own. I mean, sometimes you just want chips and salsa. This is your salsa!

Redd-Eye has other great products as well that deserved to be showcased, and I hope we can do them justice. Give ‘em a try and let them know how you like their stuff.

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