24 July 2012

Taste Test: Porters Produce Sauces (24 July 2012)

82 Ellis Lane, Ellis Lane NSW 2570


Taste buds get a saucy workout

Thanks to Craig and Trish from Porters Produce for providing me some samples of their bottled sauces. I first noticed these award winning sauces at the Good Food & Wine Show but didn't have a chance to try them at the time. Overall they were well-liked by the tasting team including myself although many thought they were quite sweet as well. Whether that's a good or bad thing is a personal preference but I was expecting them to be a bit more on the savoury side of the palate. The Simply Tomato Sauce would be ideal with a meat pie, sausage roll or hamburger. My cocktail franks and corn chips probably didn't do it justice. I'm not usually a BBQ sauce fan but the Original Sauce was very nice and one of the most popular of the range. The Chilli Original Sauce Mild was very mild on the chilli but had nice flavours which I preferred over the tomato sauce and was quite popular. The Chilli Original Sauce Medium didn't quite have enough chilli kick as we were hoping so I think an even hotter version would be well received. The Basil & Garlic Tomato Sauce had a distinctive flavour although it probably was my least favourite of the range although I wondered if it would work better in a simple pasta dish or as a pizza base sauce.

SNAPSHOT REVIEW:
PROS: Award winning sauces with very likable flavours, Good consistency and texture, Easy to pour, No Gluten range available, No artificial colours, flavours or preservatives
CONS: Seems quite sweet on the palate, Limited availability at retail shops and markets
MUST TRY: Original Sauce, Chilli Original Sauce

Simply Tomato Sauce

Basil & Garlic Tomato Sauce

Original Sauce
SIMON FAVOURITE :-)

Chilli Original Sauce Mild

Chilli Original Sauce Medium
SIMON FAVOURITE :-)

Heading up the Cocktail Franks

Taste Testing setup

Simply Tomato Sauce



Basil & Garlic Tomato Sauce



Original Sauce



Chilli Original Sauce Mild



Chilli Original Sauce Medium



Taste Test Survey Results — 100% liked

Sydney Royal Easter Show awards

Plumrose Cocktail Franks ($3.99 Coles)

Coles Original Corn Chips ($1.79)

Delivery well-packed

Well-sealed packaging looking like a suspicious item the drug squad would probably want to open

4 comments:

Craig said...

Hi Simon

Thank you for your review.

The comments were helpful.

In reply most of the sweetness comes form the ingredients used we only add the smallest amount of sugar as a natural mould inhibitor, to date we cannot find another form of natural mould inhibitor. I have made our sauces without sugar and the taste is identical but does not have high enough brix for regulations.

I would love to sell the sauces without the small amount of added sugar but we either would have to go for chemical solution or class our sauce as a fresh food with refrigeration requirements and short shelf life. What we do now we believe is a balance between being healthy and natural as possible and comply with regulations.

We started as a BBQ (Original) Sauce and people requested spicier versions so we firstly developed the mild then the medium. As we have developed each hotter version we have made sure that we have preserved the ability to still taste all the flavours first then the heat component comes in.

We are now looking into a spicier version but this will take probably 12months to develop. The development time is long because we use all natural ingredients it takes 4 weeks from making the sauce and bottling it until you know exactly what the final flavour is as there is a settling period like a curry that is always better the next day well our sauces are similar and they keep developing in flavour.

We have only been doing this for 2 years hence the limited availability as we have had to grow slowly to make sure we could keep up with production. We have just been accepted to Thomas Dux Grocer and within about 4 weeks our sauces will be on shelf.

Thank you once again for your time and doing a review.

I will be posting a link on our site to your review.

Craig

Sara - Belly Rumbles said...

LOL Simon love your cocktail frank solution for the day, Bodum! The original sauce has a lovely deep colour to it, which I like.

Simon Leong said...

hi craig, thanks for the extra info. i look forward to a spicier chilli version in the future :-)

hi sara, I had to improvise at work on how to warm the cocktail frankfurts — worked well :-)

Simon Leong said...

hi Mademoiselle Slimalicious, thanks. i see you do quite a few product reviews yourself.

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