Review: Truff Hot Sauce

This is a bizarre product.

I mean, it just seems a little different at first. It’s a table hot sauce infused with black truffles. That’s the grab. I picked some up at Whole Foods. At $15 plus tax it’s rather dear, but I got a little break on that because I brought my own bag and used my super-duper Amazon Prime Visa. It’s in an expensive glass bottle with an expensive top, which I presume is supposed to resemble a black truffle (though its asymmetry bothers me, actually). Your takeaway should be this is pitched as a premium sauce.

So what’s in Truff?

Ingredients: Truff® chili blend (red chili peppers, vinegar, organic sugar, garlic, salt, black truffle [Tuber melanosporum]), organic agave nectar, olive oil infused with black truffle essence, lycopene and glycerin (for color), spices, xantham gum

I had a goodly dollop on a Triscuit as my first experience with Truff. It’s thick and viscous, owing mostly to the oil in it. It handles a lot like Ruben’s in that regard. It is an appealing red-orange color.

Wow, is this sweet. It might be the sweetest hot sauce I’ve ever tasted. It’s literally as sweet as something you might put on ice cream. A fair bit of garlic hits next, with a little chile harmonizing. Then it all fades into something earthy and unusual, which I’m presuming is the truffle. (I don’t think I’ve ever eaten truffles.)

There is only a slight wisp of heat. Really, this is more like ketchup or Heinz 57 as a condiment. I’m not sure you’d even have to tell the heat-averse that this is “hot sauce.”

I had some on my meat loaf last week, and it worked for that, though there is some olfactory undercurrent in this sauce that doesn’t agree with Lea at all. (She doesn’t like Palo Alto in that regard either, but this was much more intense.) She couldn’t stay at the table with it out and emanating, so I dispatched the rest of it so she could come back. I’m not sure what that’s about. I mean, it has a smell, but I don’t think it’s that powerful, and I don’t find it offensive. I only mention it because of the intensity of her reaction.

The sweetness damages the sauce’s utility as an egg sauce, though it still wasn’t too bad.

Truff on my Triscuit. It’s pretty, isn’t it? (Click for larger.)

Truff on meat loaf. This worked pretty well. (Click for larger.)

Truff on my frittata. It was OK, though it’s a little sweet for this. (Click for larger.)

I’m not sure what to make of this. It tastes pleasant enough, though it doesn’t wow me, and it’s much too expensive for me to keep around solely as a curiosity. There is so little heat that I think calling it hot sauce borders on dishonest. The wife-repelling property is undesirable. However, it definitely doesn’t taste like anything else I’ve ever had, so maybe it will scratch some gustatory itches somewhere.

5/10

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