Chimay – Salsa Habanero Amarilla
On a trip to Mexico earlier this year I went a bit overboard every time I saw new hot sauces or salsas I’d never seen for sale in the United States that my checked bag was quite over weight when ready to head back home. Thankfully the gentleman at the check-in desk wasn’t sure how to charge me for the overweight bag so I was able to get quite a large load of sauces home without paying a fee that would have made them all quite expensive.
Chimay is a brand I’d never seen in the USA, but which apparently has quite a fan base amongst those who’ve tried it in Mexico as well as those who can easily pick it up along the US/Mexican border. The brand has four sauces, a green, a red, a black, and this one, their yellow. The sauces hail from the extremely southern Mexico state of Tabasco, a lush and tropical area which is the namesake of the Tabasco pepper most famously used in Tabasco brand hot sauce. The Chimay line however does not use Tabasco peppers, but rather Habaneros, though they may be grown in Tabasco, MX.
Of their lineup this yellow sauce is labeled as “extra picante” while their red sauce is “muy picante”. I’m not sure if “very hot” or “extra hot” is supposed to be hotter, but this sauce does have a great habanero flavor and a nice kick to it. Yellow habaneros are typically semi-ripe. The peppers start green, when their flavor is most vegetal and fresh, and mature to deep orange or red for the most common varieties, where they’ll take on fruitier, sweeter, and more robust flavors. Yellow being an intermediate stage will have some of the fresh vegetal notes of green combined with the fruitier notes of the ripe product, which can lead to a nice fruity tang.
That tanginess is evident as soon as you taste this sauce. It has an almost aggressive tang that’s quite assertive, which is no doubt helped by the vinegar and salt which are the 2nd and third ingredients after the habaneros. The sauce also contains unnamed “spices and aromatic herbs” which, while not listed in detail, do give it a more interesting flavor profile than just a pure habanero sauce. Perhaps it’s the color playing part of a role, but I believe some of the herbs and spices used give it a distinctly mustardy flavor, which again helps towards reinforcing that tanginess.
In comparison to a more common Mexican habanero sauce, the El Yucateco line, this in color is closest to their XXX Hot Mayan Recipe sauce, though that uses charred habaneros which this doesn’t, so there is a slight smoky taste in the El Yucateco sauce missing in this one. This does have more tanginess and that mustard note that the El Yucateco doesn’t have, and this Chimay sauce is also a bit hotter.
As a Mexican habanero sauce this pairs naturally well with Mexican food, and I enjoyed it with fajitas, tacos, burritos, and mixed with a homemade serrano sauce and chopped avocado for a chopped guacamole. The flavor profile is also neutral enough that it can play well with other cuisines, and can work with wings, though best mixed with a little butter as the salt level can become a bit overbearing otherwise.
This is a tasty sauce and one that I haven’t personally seen even in Mexican grocery stores here in the USA. It is available via importers from Amazon, though at considerably inflated prices. I look forward to checking out the other colors/flavors from their lineup as I did buy all of the versions available. Right now I can say the Amarilla version is worth picking up if you can find it for a good price.
Ingredients: Habanero Peppers, Vinegar, Salt, Olive Oil, Spices and Aromatic Herbs, Sodium Benzoate
Heat Level: 4/10. This has some punch, but as typical of habanero sauces it’s mostly a quick heat that doesn’t linger with a long burn.