L’Oro Del Sud – Crushed Calabrian Chili Peppers

Bitter: ⭐✰✰✰✰

Salty: ⭐⭐✰✰✰

Sour: ⭐✰✰✰✰

Sweet: ⭐✰✰✰✰

Umami: ⭐⭐✰✰✰

Heat: ⭐⭐✰✰✰✰✰✰✰✰

Quick Flavor Notes: Oily, fruity, smoky

Texture: Crushed chiles in an oily marinade

Recommended: Yes

Ingredients: Calabrian Hot Chile Peppers (Capsicum Annuum), Sunflower Oil, Salt, White Wine Vinegar, Citric Acid, Ascorbic Acid

L’Oro Del Sud, or in English “The Gold of the South” is a brand of imported Italian goods including pastas, sauces, and several varieties of Calabrian chiles. Appropriately named as Calabria, the point of the toe in the “boot” of Italy, is the southernmost region on the Italian mainland. While Italian food in general isn’t known for being very spicy Calabria is considered to have the spiciest food in the nation in much part due to their fondness for their Calabrian chiles.

A member of Capsicum Annuum Calabrian chiles are celebrated for their fruity, spicy, and slightly smoky flavor. In Calabria they’re used fresh, pickled, and preserved in oil. Because of their moderate heat and big flavor they’ve become popular with many chefs to use in dishes in both Italian and other cuisines. I’d been curious to try these and ordered a jar several months ago but when I went to use them couldn’t find it anywhere (I’m sure it’ll pop back up eventually) and thus had to order another with overnight delivery from Amazon when I really got the hankering.

The ingredients are fairly straightforward in the L’Oro Del Sud Crushed Calabrian Chili Peppers. Calabrian peppers, oil, some white wine vinegar for acidity, and ascorbic acid (also known as Vitamin C) as an antioxidant and Citric Acid to bring down the pH some more for preservation (for something that’s oil heavy that can be important to help prevent botulism growth which can thrive in oil rich environments). The peppers do have an attractive medium-deep red color and have a texture similar to the cherry pepper relishes often served at sub shops.

I found the flavor to me reminiscent of those sub shop cherry pepper relishes as well, though with much lower acidity and a more prominent fruity pepper element. Some of the characteristic Calabrian chile smokiness also came through giving these a deeper richer flavor than the more purely bright and tangy pepper relishes from the likes of Tallarico’s or Jersey Mike’s. The crushed peppers themselves are soft but have a nice mouthfeel and a bit of chew still. While not as acidic as some other crushed pepper condiments there’s enough acidity here to wake up the flavors. The heat level is relatively low but it does build with a warm slow burn.

I tried L’Oro Del Sud Crushed Calabrian Chili Peppers first with some chicken fettuccini alfredo that I’d picked up for takeout. Normally this is a dish which can get monotonous with too much heavy creaminess but the crushed Calabrian chiles transformed it with just the right amount of acidity, heat, and pepper flavor. With this being a very oily condiment I tried frying up some shrimp in it. The good news is there’s plenty of oil to make that work, and cooked the chiles take on a smokier and sweeter flavor. They also penetrated the shrimp very well even cooked shell-on though the downside is that they stained my fingers red to a degree that took several hand washes to remove. Using this in place of a traditional pepper relish on a sub sandwich worked as well, I went with a turkey sub and found the added oil in this helped make it taste richer and the pepper flavors still came through, though I expect in a fattier sub such as an Italian or a cheesesteak the more acidic cherry pepper relish condiments would cut through better.

I’m happy to recommend L’Oro Del Sud Crushed Calabrian Chiles. The TV chefs are right – these are some delicious peppers with a complex taste and just enough heat so that you feel it without overwhelming a dish. For those who are sensitive to too much vinegar these may be a great option as well as the vinegar flavor isn’t very pronounced.