Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Bad Buds Jerky - Hotternhail

bad buds jerky
Bad Buds Jerky is a brand run by Buddy Stone out of Hogansville, GA. Bad Buds has been in business since 2005. In addition to jerky, the brand also markets its own line of hot sauces.

Currently, Bad Buds Jerky offers four flavors, this Hotternhail, a Hotternhail Ghost, a Mild, and a Hot and Spicy.

Ingredients

Beef, soy, spices.

Taste

The first thing I taste from the surface of these pieces is a light soy sauce with a light bit of seasoning salt. I can pick up light bit of heat, and light touch of chile pepper flavor.

The chewing brings in the natural meat flavors, with a more defined soy sauce, and bit more of the chile pepper flavors.

For being marketed as, "Hotternhail", it seems to hold up. I get a good deal of heat in this, enough to warrant a "hot" (level 5 out of 5) on my personal heat scale. It's still a few levels cooler than the brands in my top-tier of hottest beef jerky brands, but this has plenty of heat to satisfy the 80% of hot food lovers.

It also has a light amount of chile pepper flavor, more so than the company's "Hot and Spicy" variety, and it has more of a habanero flavor.

Otherwise, the flavors that seem to define this jerky starts largely with the soy sauce and seasonings, with a noticeable garlic. The natural meat flavors show up pretty well in this, followed by a light chile pepper flavor.

Collectively, the ingredients all seem to compliment each other, and mix well together, creating a savory flavor with splashes of seasonings, and the goodness of chile peppers.

Meat Consistency

These are slices of whole meat, sliced into strips of three to six inches, and sliced thick.

This is a dry jerky with a slightly moist surface feel. These strips are very flexible, maybe just a touch of rubbery feel. Biting off pieces can take a little bit of work while chewing ranges from easy to moderately tough.

The chewing texture starts out feeling chewy, almost rubbery, requiring some effort to get through, but starts to break apart and soon softens up into a meaty feel. By the time its chewed down to a soft mass, it feel very steak like, perhaps cooked medium-well.

I don't see any bits or streaks of fat on these strips, but I do taste some fatty flavor. There's a fair amount of stringiness in the chewing, and I can feel wads of tough, unchewable mass.

As far as handling goes, my fingertips pick up fine films of oil and sticky, but not enough to worry about when typing on a keyboard, and they also pick up scant bits of pepper and spice.



Snack Value

I don't have pricing info, and the company's Facebook page doesn't list pricing either.

Rating

I'm giving this a good rating.

This Hotternhail beef jerky is probably my favorite of varieties offered by Bad Buds Jerky. It has much of the same characteristics of their Mild and Hot and Spicy, but just ramps up the heat and adds a decent amount of chile pepper flavor.

Otherwise, it's a good blend of soy sauce and seasonings, with a noticeable, somewhat aged, natural meat flavor. For the most part, the seasonings are largely garlic salt, but I can notice other flavors in there, but without seeing the ingredients list, it's difficult to determine what they are.

The chewing texture is great, feeling just like eating chunks of real steak, though some were a little on the tough side. I also noticed considerable stringiness, some of which matted down into wads of unchewable mass.

Rating: Good (4/5)

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