Mrs. Renfro’s – Ghost Pepper Nacho Cheese Dip
Mrs. Renfro’s seems to have a degree of popularity with the chile head crowd which makes some sense as they’re one of the larger brands offering a number of spicy salsas and associated dip products. My experiences with their product line thus far could best be described as lukewarm. I didn’t find their Habanero Mango Salsa or Ghost Pepper Salsa to be entirely objectionable but neither did I find them to be particularly appealing. I haven’t been a fan of the quality of their ingredients used, particularly the lack of fresh ghost peppers in their Ghost Pepper Salsa and their use of starch and other unnecessary additions.
The Mrs. Renfro’s Ghost Pepper Nacho Cheese Dip is the first product I’ve tried from the company that I’ve found outright distasteful. When I opened the jar I had high hopes. I’m a fan of cheese dips and have enjoyed many various other brands I’ve found on grocery store shelves. I also realize that shelf stable cheese dips are by their nature going to have some some creative chemistry in their ingredients lists – these are convenience junk foods after all. My expectation was that Mrs. Renfro’s, being something at least adjacent to a boutique brand, would be much high quality than the mass market Tostitos Queso. I was wrong.
Opening the jar the first impression of this dip is that the texture looks odd – almost grainy and loose in a way that I haven’t seen with other products of this type. The flavor stuck me as artificial more than anything else. I don’t taste cheese, I taste a plastic simulacrum that overrides the flavors of any of the vegetables and peppers inside. There is a general sense of spice but, much like their Ghost Pepper Salsa, the ghost peppers don’t show up until near the very bottom of the ingredients list and in dried form. No fresh ghost peppers flavor to be had here, and the level of heat is on the lower-medium side of things. I’m of the opinion that if you market something as a Ghost Pepper something or other than ghost peppers should be the greatest chile by volume in the product. In this case the ghost peppers (in dried form) don’t show up until after green chiles, sweet red peppers, sweet green peppers, and jalapeno peppers.
I tried to enjoy this at room temperature, cold, and hot, but no serving temperature improved the consistency or unpleasant chemically artificial flavor. Melting a block of Velveeta with a can of Ro-Tel Tomatoes with Ghost Peppers in the crockpot wouldn’t be much more work than opening this jar, and would provide something that tastes multiple orders of magnitude better.
Needless to say I can’t recommend this product. The Mrs. Renfro’s salsas I’ve tasted have at least been palatable, this cheese dip borders on the inedible.
Ingredients: Water, Dried Cheese Mix (Corn Starch, Maltodextrin, Dextrose, Salt, Whey Protein Concentrate, Inactive Dry Yeast, Cheese Flavor, Xanthan Gum, Enzyme Modified Soy Lecithin, Annatto & Paprika Extracts as color, Gum Arabic, Spices.), Tomato, Onion, Tomato Juice, Green Chile Peppers, Sweet Red Peppers, Sweet Green Peppers, Cheese Flavor (Cheese Flavor, Mozzarella Cheese [part skim low fat milk, cultures, salt, enzymes], Sodium Citrate, Xanthan Gum, Salt, Cheddar Cheese [pasteurized milk, cultures, salt, enzymes]), Canola Oil, Palm Oil, Coconut Oil, Jalapeño Peppers, Gluconic Acid, Natural Flavor, Tomato Puree, Dried Ghost Pepper, Guajillo Chile Powder, Dried Garlic, Dried Chipotle Pepper, Ancho Chile Powder, Acetic Acid.
Heat Level: 3/10. There’s a tiny bit of burn that builds some as you eat more, but the unpleasant flavor will discourage that
