Marie Sharp’s Red Hornet Sauce Review

Yes! Two in one day! Welcome back to another Hot Sauce review, everyone! I’m… in pain! Why? Because I am revisiting my favorite hot sauce company, Marie Sharp’s Sauces for a very special sauce… kinda… I’ll get into it in a minute… I need some more milk at the moment, though. Be right with you.

*goes and chugs some milk… then has some more… gargles it… then has some ice water as well*

Ok. Longer ago than I care to admit, Marie Sharp’s put out their Extra Fiery Red Hornet Sauce. Now, longtime readers know that I’m not generally a fan of super-hot sauces. I’m not here to blow my tongue up. However, as I just talked about in my previous review, how hot you think a sauce is is subjective. Some people have a really mild sauce and it’s too much for them. Others eat Carolina Reaper peppers as a light snack. Everyone’s different. And Marie Sharp’s wanted to create a sauce for those of you out there with a super-heat tolerance and a desire to push the limits. Well, they did it… twice… You’ll see what I mean in a minute. First, let’s get into the ingredients.

The Red Hornet Sauce is made of: Hornet Pepper (a pepper that, as the label says, is derived from the Trinidad Scorpion pepper), habanero pepper, vinegar, salt, white onion, and garlic.

Sound familiar? It did when I read it. Why? Because it’s the same ingredients list as the Scorpion and Habanero Pepper sauce that had been exclusive to Canada for a time. It was the last new sauce that I tried from Marie Sharp’s. So… I’ve kinda already had this sauce once. That’s… partially why I took a bit of time to do this review (and also just because I didn’t want to burn my tongue off). But, I still want to give it a fair shake. I don’t want to just say, “Eh, go read that one” because the two sauces could actually be different. In fact, I’ve not even gone and re-read my other review, just in case it makes me want to just copy what I said. If I use the same words, it’s because that’s what I feel, not because it’s what I just read. And sure, it’s the same ingredients, even in the same order, but the amounts could actually vary and make a different sauce. So, let’s get into it.

This sauce bottle also has a plastic flow control stopper on top and I’m extremely thankful for that. This isn’t a sauce that you want to over-serve yourself with. Knowing just how much sauce you’re getting is key. The sauce is rather thick, much like Marie Sharp’s original. It’s got plenty of texture in there and it ends up as small dollops where it lands. It soaks in a bit into the breading, but most stays on top.

The sauce smells much like I’ve come to associate with the super-hot sauces. There’s the smell of vinegar. And then there’s the smell of what I’ve come to call the capsaicin. I don’t know if that’s actually the case, but it’s just what I’ve come to associate as “that smells extremely spicy.”

Taking a bite… You know, these super-hots do tend to have a rather similar flavor. A bit of vinegar. Maybe a bit of the pepper. And then “HOT!” And that’s mostly what I’m getting here. Mostly. Even as my mouth starts to very rapidly heat up, I still notice that there’s a bit more complexity with this sauce than some of the others I’ve had. Sure, it’s still mostly straightforward, but the onion and garlic seem to play just a bit more into things than simply vinegar and Sterno in my mouth. I won’t go so far as to say it’s a favorite flavor of mine. I feel I greatly prefer Marie’s original (and especially Smoked Habanero), but (except for the extreme heat) it’s not an unpleasant flavor. I’ve had some sauces that I just did not like the taste of. Here, I feel that if there just wasn’t so much capsaicin flying around, I might actually like the flavor of this one alright.

Now, heat… There’s a lot. A whole lot. Like, a whole lot a lot. Like, much more than I really can handle a lot. But, it’s not a stinging, searing pain. It’s definitely not the hottest I’ve had. But it’s still definitely up there solidly in the super-hots category. If you’re going to give this one a go, you need to know what you’re doing, use in moderation, and understand the situation.

There are people out there that had criticized Marie Sharp’s sauces for not having a super-hot. That’s what lead to the development of this sauce. And it’s easy to see that Marie went about it in her own way. She could’ve probably just sourced Reapers and thrown them in a bottle, but she worked on making her own peppers. She added in her signature habaneros. And she still made a sauce that has a real flavor to it besides the aforementioned vinegar and Sterno. I am not the target audience for this sauce as it’s hotter than I like. But if you’re one for super-hots, I would suggest giving this one a go.

Suggested dishes: As always with these super-hots, I find it hard to say, “So, I would put it on (food)!” because, I mean, personally, I wouldn’t. But if I had to say anything, I would say that the general sort of nature of the sauce, it does seem like it would be good on a wide variety of things. I.E. – use this as you would other general-use hot sauces. Just know that this one’s obviously a lot hotter.

If you’re looking to give this sauce a try for yourself, you can find it on the Marie Sharp’s US website here: https://mariesharpsusa.com/collections/sauces-only/products/new-red-hornet-pepper-sauce-limited-edition-marie-s-hottest