Since the start of Need the Heat in 2020, we have gotten a lot of love from the hot sauce community, but we also had a lot of discussions with people who don’t like hot sauce as a condiment.

Often we find out during these discussions that they don’t understand the concept of hot sauce or the product as a condiment. Our mission is to let everyone enjoy the hot sauce, so we want to clear out the 4 biggest misunderstandings about hot sauce.

Hot sauce messes up/takes over the flavour of my food

This is actually the case with all sauces when you use too much. That is the case with ketchup, mayo and so forth. It’s about using it responsibly and pairing the proper hot sauce with your dish.

For example: when you want to enjoy some ribs from the bbq, you’ll want to pair that with a nice and smokey hot sauce. This way, it won’t take over the flavour of your food but complement it and make it even better.

Hot sauce is only hot

In some cases, that is true (like Da Bomb Beyond Insanity), but luckily most brands nowadays focus on flavour first and then heat.

The result is an unbelievably varied offer with many different peppers and unique ingredients. We even dare to say that hot sauce is the most versatile condiment. So definitely not only hot.

Hot sauce is dangerous/unhealthy condiment

It is not dangerous, and it is most definitely not unhealthy.

For example, ketchup contains a lot of sugar, and mayo a lot of saturated fats, but hot sauce almost always has no (or very little) added sugar and/or saturated fats.

Sometimes it is pretty high on the salt levels, but we see brands trying to keep it as low as possible. It makes it one of the most healthy sauces and is not dangerous.

We advise people with heart problems to steer clear of extremely hot sauces because it might raise the heart rate if you can’t handle the heat.

“I’m just not made for spicy food.”

This is the most common argument from people who say they don’t like hot sauce. Often they never really tried it, are scared of it or had a bad experience with it.

Hot sauce is something you can get used to, though. The offering starts with incredibly mild hot sauces that everyone can handle that are perfect to start your hot sauce journey.

From there on out, you can start climbing the ladder and go hotter very gently.

This way, everyone can enjoy the hot sauce, and let’s be honest: everyone should be able to enjoy the most fantastic condiment ever.

Need the Heat products

We always focus on #flavourfirst. It’s our “golden rule”. We use habanero peppers as our source of heat, but that takes a second to kick in.