I finally finished the sauces and had a chance to try them all out. For tasting, I made wings, a total of 8. Seven sauces plus Frank’s Red Hot as a baseline. My sauces were made with Jalapeno, Cayenne, Tepin, Habanero, Ghost, Yellow Reaper, and Carolina Reaper. See Sauce Experiment for recipe.

Results

Jalapeno

For some reason this one came out a lot thinner than the others. It left me wondering if I did it right – there was almost no heat and barely any flavor. All I really noticed was a slight bitterness. Given that I already don’t care much for Jalapenos, I doubt I’ll ever make more.

Cayenne

This one was quite a bit thicker and really stuck to the chicken. The flavor was pretty close to Frank’s – a little sweeter, but that’s probably because I used the Fiesta cayennes so there was a mix of red, yellow, and orange, instead of straight reds. Heat was close to Frank’s too, maybe a little lower. It’s easier to just buy Frank’s but it’s good to know I can make something really close.

Tepin

The thickest of all of them. The flavor was a little odd with some fairly strong bitter notes; it’s difficult to describe exactly what I tasted. It was definitely not fruity or bright in any way, and not very sweet. The heat was a pretty big step from the cayenne, building from back to front. Given the flavor I won’t be making this again.

Habanero

A little thicker than the cayenne, nowhere near the Tepin. The flavor was (unsurprisingly) very fruity and sweet. Hotter than the Tepin but much less aggressive, building slowly and allowing a good time to take in the flavor. Will definitely be making more of this.

Ghost

Just like the Habanero in texture. Flavor was more bitter, not too fruity. A flavor I can only describe as a “not-the-heat-capsaicin” flavor seemed to overwhelm most of any other flavors. Heat was much more aggressive than the Habanero and much hotter. After a hard hit up front, it continued to build up for a couple minutes. I might use this as a base for something really hot, but not as-is, the flavor just doesn’t work.

Yellow Reaper

So far the Chinenses all have a similar texture. They also all fermented the best as well. This one still had the bitter/”nthc” flavor but not as strongly as the Ghost, and overall was somewhat sweeter. The biggest surprise was that it wasn’t as hot as I expected (probably because the step up to Ghost was a much larger step that this one). Similar conclusion as with the Ghost – maybe I’ll use it as a base but not as-is. But I really liked the bright yellow color, so that’s a reason to play with it some more!

Carolina Reaper

Same thickness and texture as the last three. Like the other supers, a fairly strong bitter/”nthc” flavor. The heat didn’t hit as hard up-front as I expected, but I got a really good throat burn that then spread forward until my whole mouth was on fire. The heat continued to build after I was done for a good 5 minutes. Nothing special about this so I probably won’t make any more of it.

So there it is! If you’ve done similar or have your own observations to add I would love to hear them!