How To Take Your Spicy Marinades To The Next Level With Hot Sauce Blends

There's nothing that takes meat or fish to another level quite like a bit of heat. Spice gives food a mouthwatering flavor while embracing the sweet and savory parts of the protein. You can always bring the heat by sprinkling some ground chili or red pepper flakes into a marinade, but for the best results, play around with a blend of different hot sauces.

A good bottle of hot sauce is one of our favorite shortcuts to flavorful food. While the peppers in the condiment can take a fruity, smoky, or zesty turn, there's also an abundance of ingredients that complement their taste, providing you with a layered, delicious dish. For the best flavor payoff, Noah Chaimberg, founder and CEO of Heatonist, likes to combine different hot sauces together. "Blending sauces is a true hot sauce lover move! I'd recommend looking for complementary ingredients that you know play well in each sauce," Chaimberg told Tasting Table. "For example, Queen Majesty's Jalapeño Tequila Lime melds deliciously with a smoky chipotle sauce like our Hot Ones Los Calientes Barbacoa."

The bright, citrusy jalapeño and lime sauce uplifts the smoky, fiery chipotle sauce. While the divergent tasting notes taste different on the surface, the two condiments share some similar ingredients, making them work well together. Both hot sauces contain lime juice, as well as earthy, pungent garlic. With these commonalities, they're able to flavor a single dish without competing.

Once you get your hands on a few bottles from unusual hot sauce brands, you may want to start mixing them straight away. To ensure that they have complementary flavors, try picking condiments according to cuisine. Even if the ingredients in two different bottles aren't an exact match, they should taste cohesive in a dish from the same region.

The two hot sauces that Chaimberg suggested would pair well with a Tex-Mex dish such as smoky chipotle steak with chipotle butter. The mix of chipotle peppers and garlic gets a bright, herbaceous kick from the cilantro and lime in the marinade. Though the mix of ingredients are dissimilar, the combination is frequently used in Tex-Mex dishes, as well as foods from south of the border, making the two hot sauces perfect for each other.

If you're looking for something a little sweeter, this Sweet Onion Habanero hot sauce pairs beautifully with the Caribbean Style Mango Habanero hot sauce. The fruity, zingy pepper has a tropical taste, making it perfect for a tofu burger with grilled pineapple salsa. The juicy mango gets a bit of earthiness from the onions while the fruit, rice wine vinegar, and orange bell pepper in the mango hot sauce gives the allium a bright boost.