Juango / 26 April 2025 / Categories: Product and Brands, Brands, Food

El Yucateco Hot Sauce Does Contain Lead says University of Nevada

And I love it so much I keep this green hot sauce on stock

Some people will be thinking I am really dumb. Others will be thinking I’m not giving up hot sauce. Some people like ketchup, some dudes like Mayonnaise. Me I am the original hot sauce guy. Doesn’t matter menudo, enchaladas, chimichangas tamales, whatever, here, we put it on everything.

I like heat and for anyone familiar with the Scoville scale these sauces rank 7,600 to 9,500. El Yucateco's Red Habanero Hot Sauce is created from a classic recipe, blending habanero peppers and tomatoes.

This Mexican branded hot sauce El Yucateco is the brand to buy. Forget Tabasco if you want a real habanero kick. salsa red sauce is supposed to be hotter than green sauce and then XXX is hotter still.

For me if you want heat the green is the one to get at $2.75. I know it’s not supposed to be everyone says go for XXX but I find I can go a bit crazy with XXX where as if I put too much green it’s a mouth explosion.

The green hot sauce is made from green habanero peppers, the kick, the red sauce is made from red habaneros which give a slightly sweeter flavour to me and has tomatoes in the recipe, accounting for the colour and heat downgrade I think.

The debate goes on which hot sauce red or green is better. For me with 25% habanero in the green and 30% supposedly in the red the red should be hotter, personally I cannot taste it, I prefer the flavour of the green.

The Los Angeles times published an article about lead content in hot sauce alluding to potential threats as far back as 2013 which Hot sauce fans may have read with concern. There’s a reason it might be only a couple of bucks a bottle if you pick it up at Walmart.

The interesting thing for me, sauces destined for international markets contained less lead than local Mexican supply because the food and drug administration standards are higher which doesn’t say a great deal for the ethics of the brand.

Hey it’s a great sauce and living in Los Angeles the air quality is probably more dangerous for lead pollution poisoning than the hot sauce.

I understand after the article published the findings of the University of Nevada, El Yucateco did try to mitigate the commercial damage with some tests of their own stating they were unable to replicate the findings, discovering no trace elements of lead themselves. Yet of course they’d say that. Like smoking, the claims haven’t stopped me purchasing my favourite El Yucateco green sauce. Oh and no one else has found lead in the sauce since 2013. I have it a lot and think we’ll be fine. Your thoughts on the ongoing debate Green or Red hot sauce or even XXX from El Yucateco. Let me know?