Sauce Up NYC Garlic Chip Comparison

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Sauce Up NYC Garlic Chip Comparison: Original vs. Chipotle

Sauce Up NYC already has a deep lineup on the site — the Original Chili Crisp, the Extra Spicy, the White Truffle, the Salsa Macha, and even a Pineapple Mango Salsa Macha. The Garlic Chip line is a different animal. These aren’t chili crisps. The brand calls them “chili sauce,” but even that undersells how far they’ve drifted from the chili crisp format. They’re garlic granola — huge fried garlic chips and shallots bound together with honey. The chili is a background actor at best.

I reviewed the Original and the Chipotle individually. Both landed at GOOD. But side by side, the differences are sharper than you’d expect from two jars that share the same base ingredients and the same texture. This comparison covers what’s actually different, because the answer isn’t obvious from the labels.

Sauce Up NYC Garlic Chip Comparison Table

Tiers reflect in-context comparison performance. Individual review tiers may differ.

What They Share

A lot. Both jars are packed to the brim with crispy bits all the way to the top. The oil barely moves in either one — it seeps through the garlic chips rather than sitting in a separate layer. Both are 90 calories per tablespoon serving, both use grapeseed oil as the base, and both open with the same three ingredients: grapeseed oil, fried garlic chips, fried shallots. The labeling is identical in style, same jar format, same “shake / mix well before serving” instruction.

The texture is where the similarities are strongest. Both feel like garlic granola. The honey binds everything into thick, sticky clusters — big chunks of garlic and shallot clumped together with seeds scattered throughout. Both are packed so tight you can barely get a fork in on the first few servings. The crunch is excellent in both, and it holds up. These are not jars where the bits fade away after two seconds.

The oil behavior is similar too. In both jars, the oil underneath the top crunchy layer runs sweeter than the bits themselves. You need to take the oil and the crunchy bits together to get the full picture. If you just eat off the surface, you’re getting half the flavor.

Where the Ingredients Split

The core is the same. The edges are where the personality lives.

The Original uses “East Coast wildflower honey” — a specific, sourced callout that tells you someone thought about this ingredient. The Chipotle just says “honey.” Small detail, but the label reader in me notices.

The nut and seed base differs. The Original uses only roasted peanut. The Chipotle adds sunflower seeds alongside the peanut, which gives it more seed crunch and a slightly different texture density. Both include white sesame seed.

The chili base is the biggest ingredient gap. The Original lists “dried red chilies” — generic, unnamed, and functionally invisible on the palate. The Chipotle names its chilies: morita and guajillo. Morita is a type of chipotle — smaller and smokier than the common meco variety. Guajillo adds mild, slightly fruity warmth. Both are traditional salsa macha ingredients, which is part of why the Chipotle variant feels more like a macha than a chili sauce.

Then there’s cumin. It’s the last ingredient in the Chipotle and doesn’t appear in the Original at all. That one addition changes the entire flavor direction. The sugar names differ slightly — “coconut sugar” versus “coconut palm sugar” — but that’s likely the same thing labeled two ways.

Texture and Crunch

Essentially identical. I can’t tell the two apart on texture alone. Both feel like garlic granola — honey makes everything stick together in thick clusters. Big chunks of garlic and shallot, visible seeds, packed to the brim, hard to stir. The crunch is immediate and holds up in both. If texture is your primary shopping criterion, it’s a coin flip.

Flavor Comparison

Original

Garlic takes the front seat. Right away — fried crunch, garlic filling the space. The sweetness from the wildflower honey and coconut sugar follows, balancing the bitterness that this much raw garlic would normally bring. The soy sauce powder — last on the ingredient list — lingers longest on the aftertaste. Classic case of a bottom-of-the-list ingredient punching above its weight.

What you won’t find: chili. The dried red chilies are in there by label but not by presence. No distinctive chili flavor, which is actually what makes this jar so versatile. It doesn’t commit to one cuisine. Garlic crunch with a honey-salt finish works on just about anything.

Chipotle

Different introduction entirely. Cumin hits first — right away, before anything else. Then salt, and there’s a lot of it. The double sodium source (soy sauce powder plus Himalayan pink salt) makes itself known immediately. An initial bitter garlic note fades into a smoky chili aftertaste as the morita and guajillo take over. That transition does a good job balancing out.

The cumin and named chilies give this jar something the Original doesn’t have: a direction. It leans Mexican. The chipotle, cumin, and guajillo together create a flavor identity that the Original’s generic red chilies never attempt. This is a jar that knows what it wants to be.

The Oil Layer (Both)

In both jars, the oil underneath the top crunchy layer is sweeter than the bits themselves. Take the oil and bits together and you get the whole picture — garlic crunch up front, sweetness from the honey, and then the seasoning tail (soy sauce in the Original, cumin-chipotle in the Chipotle). Both jars need mixing to perform — the label’s stir instruction isn’t optional.

Heat

Neither jar is spicy. Both read “mildly hot” on the lid and neither delivers more than a suggestion of warmth. The Original has zero detectable heat. The Chipotle has a mild burn on the tongue that fades fast — I’d call it a 1 out of 5 for both. If you’re shopping for heat, these aren’t the jars.

Which One for What

The Original keeps its options open. No distinctive chili flavor means it can ride with Italian, Mexican, Chinese, or Japanese food without clashing. The Chipotle commits — the cumin and chipotle point it toward Tex-Mex and Mexican food, and it’s better for that commitment. Neither is wrong. It’s a question of whether you want a utility player or a specialist.

Are They Worth It?

The Original runs $2.17/oz. The Chipotle is $2.50/oz — two dollars more per jar for the same 6-ounce format. The price difference isn’t huge, but the Chipotle doesn’t give you more product for the extra cost. You’re paying for the morita, guajillo, sunflower seeds, and cumin — ingredients that do earn their spot. Both jars are packed generously. No air, no wasted space, no oil lake with three floating garlic chips at the bottom.

For a handmade NYC product in the specialty condiment space, both prices are reasonable. Neither is a steal, but neither feels overpriced for what you’re getting.

Final Verdict