We are constantly thrilled to find that there are people who can make hot sauce at home that is every bit as good as the ones you buy from the professional sauce makers. However, it often takes numerous rounds of experimentation to get your sauce just right. Thank goodness for events like the amateur hot sauce competition from this past Cinco D’Ohio Festival at the North Market here in Columbus, OH. Gathered were a collection of amateur hot sauce creators dueling for the affection of the judges (myself included), and these sauces by Donavan Stanley were the runaway winners amongst the competition. Donavan was thoughtful enough to have some extras on hand (in some spiffy frosted bottles) to share with us to try without the pressure of making a spot decision on their merit.

Precious Booty Ingredients: Tomato puree, Rum, malt vinegar, habanero peppers, shallots, onions, honey, brown sugar, rice vinegar, jolokia pepper, spices.

Purple Nurple Ingredients: Black Currant Preserves (Black Currants, Sugar, Glucose Syrup, Citric Acid, Fruit Pectin), Vinegar, habanero peppers, jolokia peppers.

Precious Booty tasting notes: Rum and habanero peppers seems to go as well together in this sauce as PB&J. Great mouth feel of the habanero with the rum aftertaste, melded together with a base of tomato-ey goodness. There’s just enough sweetness from the honey and sugar to offset the heat a little, but it’s still a very balanced flavor. This is a fairly polished sauce that could go easily into production if the recipe is standardized. My only constructive criticism to this sauce is that I would add just a touch of some kind of salt, but that’s pretty minor. Pretty amazing to have a sauce with not just one, but two, kinds of vinegar which doesn’t have one iota of the tartness all-too-common to those sorts of hot sauces.

This was the sauce I found to have more utility, as it went well in and on a variety of foods. Honestly, I preferred to just slather it like a condiment (try some on a hamburger!) or just coat it over some broiled chicken to get the full flavor. The consistency is great for that “cling” factor as well.

Purple Nurple tasting notes: This was the sauce that had the judges buzzing. The aroma is luscious with the currants! Admittedly, I’d never tried a hot sauce like this made with currants in any fashion. Currants, as well as raisins, have always been a little sweet for my taste, and I’ve generally eschewed sauces with those in it because of that. If there’s one thing to make your forget about some sweetness, it’s the unmistakable flavor and heat of habanero and Jolokia peppers. This sauce is gorgeous in its simplicity. Both a little sweet and a lot spicy, this sauce will make you crave for stuff put it upon.

Speaking of which, I liked using this sauce to help spice up some boring marinades…both for meat and veggies. The fruitiness is not a perfect match with any one kind of food, so your mileage with this sauce may vary. It was good enough for me with lunch with my chicken fingers such that I’d use it again with that anytime.

Overall recommendation: Donavan made a strong statement with these sauces about how strong in quality they are, and we’re green with envy over them. They’re not perfect, but close enough such that Id actually pay money for them if I had the chance. Way to go, Donavan. Great stuff!!!

Don’t forget to check out Donavan’s hot and spicy food blog called Mommy…It Burns!

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