The Caramel Sauce Brand You Should Never Buy At The Grocery Store

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One of the best parts of enjoying dessert is all the toppings that can add flavor, color, and texture to it. While some ice cream enthusiasts may prefer chocolate sauce, fruit, or marshmallow fluff, caramel sauce is also among the most popular dessert toppings. A good caramel sauce can add a rich ribbon of color to ice cream and baked treats along with sweetness and a deliciously silky texture. Somewhat shockingly, though, of the many different caramel sauce varieties available, the worst brand is found at a popular retailer.

Tasting Table tried and ranked 14 different caramel sauce brands, and the worst of the group was undoubtedly Target's Favorite Day brand. This sauce includes brown butter, which intrigued us because it's usually found in more artisan-style creations. The brown butter gives the sauce a bronze-like color and it also boasted an approachable thickness, which made it easy to spoon onto ice cream and other goodies.

Unfortunately, our curiosity about this sauce ended the minute we tasted it. Once the sweetness hit in full, we found the taste rather unpleasant, strangely similar to charred firewood. Subsequent bites did nothing to quell the shock and unpleasantness of the flavor. But when it finally went away, we were left with an overpowering sweetness. The overall experience made it so we won't try Favorite Day's sauce again.

The ingredients of Target's Favorite Day caramel sauce include cane sugar, natural flavors, and brown butter, but the dessert topping itself doesn't appear to be a hit with customers. Reviews on Target's website describe the taste as "soapy [and] really unpleasant" and "like plastic [with] no hint of caramel." Other customers dinged the dessert topping for its "Odd aftertaste and consistency," similar to Tasting Table's disappointing experience with it. 

The flavor in particular seems to be a real sticking point for customers (no pun intended). In fact, one reviewer confessed that the taste was so bad that the whole jar was ultimately thrown out. The reason for the bad taste also varies from person to person, with some customers describing it as not tasting like caramel whatsoever, while others claimed that it didn't even offer a hint of brown butter despite it being front and center on the jar.

For those who want to spend their hard-earned money on good caramel sauce, we would recommend our top choice, Coop's Salted Caramel Sauce. This decadent dessert topping features a rich color and a balanced flavor palette that, crucially, doesn't leave an unpleasant aftertaste on the tongue. There's also always the option of making a homemade caramel sauce to your own tastes that adds plenty of flavor to ice cream, desserts, and even coffee.