Ah jerky, how I love thee. There are few things that give me such pleasure in life; mangos, good beer (no BMC for me), hot sauce, and jerky! Now that I have savored every bit of Ed’s Roadhouse Jerky I’m ready to review it.

Ed’s Roadhouse Jerky: L’il Sweet Jalapeno Habanero and Devil’s Tongue Ingredients: Angus beef eye of round, fresh Habaneros and Jalapenos, water, garlic, salt, sugar, soybean, wheat, salt, natural flavoring spices, molasses, pepper extract.

The packaging here is simple but to the point. It gives you that professional but not mass produced feel. The logo is very nice and the text is easy to read and well separated. As you can see by the ingredients, the order did not change from the L’ill Sweet Jalapeno Habanero to the Devil’s Tongue so I was a little concerned that there wasn’t going to be a flavor difference but there is.

The appearance of the product is top notch as well. It’s nice to see all the spices and the occasional pepper seed on the meat for once. Too many places try to hide that and make it more of a homogonous look. Bah I say! Show me what I’m eating and let me bask in the color contrasts of meat to spice.

Now let’s go for the taste of the L’il Sweet Jalapeno Habanero. Mmmm….love that chewy texture. It makes you work to eat it but also melts in your mouth, a perfect sampling of how jerky should be. It’s subtly sweet at first then flows into a complex layering of flavors. Beefy, peppery, then smoky with a hint of salt, coming up with a Jalapeno “greenness” and then back to slightly sweet and finally finishing with a pepper bite.

There is a slight heat here which is surprising because there’s extract in it (I was expecting more heat) but no extract flavor which is good. You get a slight tongue tingle and a little back of the throat burn and the heat remains consistent the more you eat. Very enjoyable.

Switching to the Devil’s Tongue I find a similar chewieness but it’s slightly more dry than the L’il Sweet Jalapeno Habanero. The taste is a little similar to the other one as well. The beef taste is right up front which melds into a fruity Habanero flavor, then the molasses and sugar, then some black pepper spices. The lesser of the two as far as flavor goes but still an amazingly flavorful product!

The heat on this one is a bit inconsistent from piece to piece. There is a noticeable extract type burn where it gets into the pours of your tongue and kicks around a bit. Nice creeping heat from the instant your start chewing and lingering long after you finish.

These are really fresh tasting as well and I have to give Ed some major props for not using any preservatives (I’ll allergic to a lot of them especially artificial sulfites and nitrates so it’s nice to find a jerky that won’t give me problems). Hats off to you Ed, what a wildly top shelf product you have here. Folks, be sure to check out all of his jerky products because I’m sure they are all just as top notch as the two I’ve reviewed here.

Ed’sRoadhouse Jerky: L’il Sweet Jalapeno Habanero Taste: 9.5, Heat: 5

Ed’sRoadhouse Jerky: Devil’s Tongue Taste: 8.7, Heat: 6.42