Mrs. Renfro’s – Ghost Pepper Salsa
After first trying the Mrs. Renfro’s Mango Habanero Salsa I was eager to try their spicier and more savory flavors. I can get behind a bit of sweet heat on occasion, but my true love lies with the sour, spicy, piquant, and savory. Since I’d generally enjoyed even their sweeter flavor, I placed an order with the company for a selection of four spicier products, and this is the first I decided to open.
Ghost Peppers have become something of a marketing buzz word lately, with many fast food places and convenience food manufacturers rolling out ghost pepper this and ghost pepper that. Oftentimes it turns out to be little more than marketing with no discernable ghost pepper flavor or true heat, and in the worst cases they use just extracts without any real peppers so instead of the beautifully savory smoky flavor of the ghost pepper there’s just an unpleasant artificial chemical taste. Mrs. Renfro’s Ghost Pepper Salsa doesn’t fall into all of those traps, but it in my opinion it also falls short of what it could be.
The biggest positive is that there is some real ghost pepper flavor in this sauce. I detect that earthy smoky flavor that the ghost pepper brings, and there’s that little hint of pepper burn. I’ll also commend them for not including any extra sugar other than what’s naturally in the tomatoes used. The overall taste of this salsa is nice, rich, and savory. Aside from the ghost peppers there’s a nice cast of other peppers used including Ancho, Guajillo, Chipotle, Jalapeno, and Green Chile plus natural mesquite smoke flavor.
On the other hand I do find it to be a bit thin in texture, and I wish it had bigger chunks of both tomatoes and the chile peppers used. Ghost peppers are also fairly gar down the ingredients list, and they were introduced to the salsa in a dried form instead of a fresh one. In fact the salsa relies on many dried ingredients including the onion, garlic, and cilantro instead of using the more expensive but superior tasting fresh options. The other peppers and smoke flavor used in the salsa do give it a full flavor, but they also obscure the taste of the ghost pepper. The biggest gripe I have is the use of ghost pepper oleoresin, which is a type of pepper extract. This salsa also uses corn starch as a thickener which wouldn’t be necessary if it had been made thicker naturally by making it chunkier with more fresh chopped real peppers.
Despite what may seem like a bit of a negative review I did enjoy this salsa, I’m simply frustrated that for a brand that bills itself as premium that they cut so many corners and made this less than it could have been. I would still recommend it for now, at least unless I find a ghost pepper salsa made with real fresh ghost peppers and no artificial ingredients.
Ingredients: Tomatoes, Water, Jalapeno Peppers, Tomato Juice, Green Chile Peppers, Distilled Vinegar, Corn Starch, Salt, Dried Onions, Dried Ghost Pepper, Dried Garlic, Spices, Dried Cilantro, Ancho Chile Powder, Guajillo Chile Powder, Chipotle Pepper Powder, Mesquite Smoke Flavor, Oleoresin Ghost Pepper.
Heat Level: 3/10. This has some kick, but it’s on the milder side of medium overall on the chile head scale. The ghost peppers exist as a flavor more than as a strong burn element in this.
