Yellow Mustard Review - Alstertor Düsseldorf-Style Mustard

     It's been a while, it really has. 5 more days than a year, to be exact. But fear not, my mustardy allies, for although I have not been writing mustard reviews for more than 12 months, I have most certainly been delighting my taste buds with that succulent mix of mustard seed and vinegar that we all know and love. I promise to you all, this will be only the first in a new string of mustard reviews that will seek to improve upon the platform I built a year ago. And with that, I bring you the king of the mustards I have tried in 2015, a true tour de force coming at you from the Rhineland: the Alstertor Düsseldorf-Style Mustard!

An adorable mug o' mustard!

     As per tradition here on Hard Yellow, I shall first address the vessel for the mustard; in this case, it is a lovely glassware in the shape of a classic German beer mug, tenderly made in what I can presume is only the most noble of German factories. While you, dear reader, may guffaw at the premise of a handled mustard jar, I rebute thee - having a handle only allows for increased precision when you come down to scraping the last knifeloads of mustardy goodness out of the jar. And after all, it doubles as a glass afterwards!  But let me be clear, although the choice of container is fabulous, this is by no means the best part of the this mustard.

     This mustard, in what I can only assume is what other Düsseldorf-style mustard strive to be, is audaciously smooth, even to the point of being 'creamy'. I was awed by the unique consistency of this fine specimen, which was also surprisingly light. The taste itself was a milder yellow mustard, definitely not as vinegary as a traditional American yellow; the mustard flavor was allowed to shine through, which I always appreciate. The fact that it's on the milder side does mean it's not the best choice on a sandwich, where you need a strong mustard like Colman's English to punch through the bread and meats - this mustard is best for dipping meats like pork or comping with potatoes or pretzels, situations where it does not overpower, but complements the food. In this way, this mustard is very refined, above the usual proletarian yellow mustards; this is a high-class fellow, deserving to be used in your finest meals.

     For my first mustard rating of 2016, I give this fantastic mustard a 9 out of 10, up there with other stellar mustards like the Colman's English and Olivier Cognac mustards. This is a culinary delicacy that one cannot afford to miss. And to you, I bid you a happy February of mustardy splendor!

Speciality Mustard Review - Olivier Cognac Mustard

Welcome, fellow Mustardeers, to another installment of Hard Yellow mustard reviews from your resident mustard fanatic! To help out for this post, my new editor has carefully reviewed this review to make this post the best it could be. (I pay him in handshakes.)

For our first real review of 2015, I present to you a masterpiece - Olivier's Cognac Mustard. As usual, I have to discuss the jar first before anything else; this is the mustard's only fault. The jar is unfortuantely quite unwirlding, especially the top; it gets stuck very easily, and ios one of those agravating tops that's hard to put back on again easily.

But with that over with, let's move on to the actual mustard!

From the vineyards of Napa Valley!

 
The stuff is magnificent. It smells pleasing, unlike other mustard involving alcoholic ingredients like dijon mustard; and the taste is unbelievable. It's almost creamy in taste, with a pleasant amount of mustard; the cognac definitely pulls it all together. This mustard is wonderful on most anything involving meat; I first had it on ham, which was delicious.

I looked at the ingredients, and they're quite interesting. The mustard is in fact a blend of stone ground mustard, dijon mustard and cognac. This lends for a mustard with both great taste and texture; there are just enough seeds to keep it interesting, but not too many to make it a birdseed-mustard.

Overall, this elegant mustard gets 9 french spirits out of 10; the taste is unbelievable, and it's definitely one of my favorite mustards, but for the reasons of the jar and my refusal of giving anything a perfect score, it stays at a 9.

Dijon Mustard Review - Edmond Fallot Basil

C'est une belle moutarde, oui?

Welcome, fellow mustardeers, to the world of French mustard! Or, should I say, la monde des moutardes françaises! (My French is horrible, just warning you now.)

Mustard has been a part of French cuisine for centuries, chiefly dijon mustard, a classic variety of mustard made with white wine in lieu of vinegar. Now, most dijons do not actually sire from the original French city of Dijon. However, the Fallot Mustard Mill, which creates Edmon Fallot-brand mustard, is actually located in the Burgundian region of France, of which Dijon is the capital. (Their website is honestly fantastic, if translated a bit wonkily.) It doesn't get much more authentic than this!

Walking through my local HomeGoods the other day, I found this noble-looking jar with an orange mark-down sticker upon it. Half an hour later, I was home with my surprisingly inexpensive little prize. May the mustardy gods bless thee, HomeGoods!

Upon opening the stately jar, you find that the mustard is very, very pungent in smell, like many traditionally made mustards. Do not see this as a turn-off, however - the strong smell of white wine is not what it will taste like. In fact, the mustard does not taste much like white wine at all - it has an incredibly powerful basil taste. I found it overpowering when used as a dip for meats, so I recommend using it in conjunction with starches or bread. The mustard flavor is not the strongest, but I find that acceptable, given that the centerpiece of this particular mustard is it's basil attribute.

This mustard is quite the experience, and I recommend it to all those who enjoy pesto more than anything. I give it 7 basil leaves out of 10; it was often overpowering, but all in all, it was a formidable mustard that is worth your time.

Honey Mustard Review: Inglehoffer Sweet

The jar is so small. Yet so cute!

Ah, honey mustard. Despite it being quite good, I personally don't see it as much. It's main purpose in my eyes is to be a gateway for new mustard fans into the condiment jungle, not necessarily a great condiment. And unfortunately, this mustard has not proven me wrong.

I'm not saying this mustard is bad, of course; it's just that honey mustards feel a bit adulterated to my refined mustardy palette by now. But frankly, I just don't find this mustard living up to my past experiences with honey mustard either, when I was but a little tyke who ate macaroni and cheese for every other meal. I find the initial taste to be a little off-putting at first. I was taken a little bit aback; the stuff hit my tongue, and I was expecting an immediate, rich honey taste. What I got was a clashing honey and mustard. It did resolve quickly, but it was not a nice entry.

My other criticism is that the mustard was very thin. I'm accustomed now to the thick glory of strong, full-bodied mustards, so this came as a bit of a surprise. The mustard just seems to take a natural back-seat role to anything it's on. I didn't even taste it last time I used it.

And yes, I know, honey mustard is supposed to be used as a dipping sauce less than a spread. But this segways nicely into my next point - the jar size. It's a dinky little thing that makes you want to conserve the stuff, not use it as a dip at a party. The jar is pretty nice and distinctive, but come on! It's just too little.

I'd give this mustard 6 childhood memories out of 10. It wasnt bad, but I just didn't love it either. Stick to what you're good at, Inglehoffer - strong stuff.

Maybe in the future I'll find a good honey mustard. But for now, catch you again on Friday.

Deli Mustard Review: Kosciusko Spicy Brown

Just look at it's spicy brownness!

Welcome back, my mustardy fellows, to Hard Yellow!

Before we get started, I'd just like to announce that these reviews will be coming out more slowly than our past rapid-fire posts. This will ensure quality of posts, so you will get the best reviews of mustard possible!

So, onto the mustard. Just look at this thing. How can a mustard in a barrel-shaped bottle be bad? (It's also 100% natural. Apparently.) It looks like a dignified mustard, without being complacent enough to come in a glass jar. And dignified this mustard is!

The taste of this mustard is very nice. Not super vinegary, it carries that clean deli mustard taste I have grown to love in recent years. The spiciness that Kosciusko vouches isn't horribly strong. It's not the swift kick that Colman's offers, it's more of a hard yet friendly pat on the back. Because it's not so overpowering, it's good for when you want the mustard to take a supporting role, like on a good sandwich. In short, this is your "eating-a-sandwich-at-3-in-the-afternoon" kind of mustard; something that comforts, helps you along, but doesn't blow your taste buds immediately away.

I'd give this mustard 7 lazy summer days out of 10. It's a nice mustard, goes well with a good amount of stuff, and generally can hold it's own. It's a great addition to a mustard geek's collection.

Yellow Mustard - Colman's Original English

Note the unique bottle shape.

Ahhh, Colman's. There's no way a mustard connoisseur can not like this hallmark English mustard. There's just so much to be excited for when you see this condiment on the table.

Let's start with our usual critique of the bottle. This shape is immediately identifiable as Colman's - the slightly bell-shaped slope of the bottle is it's trademark look. The screw cap keeps the desolate wasteland look away, and gives it that fancy mustard air.

The mustard itself, however, is a tour de force of the English variety of mustard as a whole. It's a very strong mustard, with that heat that you would expect from a specimen of the English variety of the condiment jungle. It's a tiny bit sweet after the initial punch of heat; or maybe that was just my taste buds recuperating from the wave of mustardy goodness. It's hard to tell sometimes.

This mustard is good on pretty much anything that's English-esqe. Ham sandwich? Oh course. Pork? By all means. Potatoes? Absolutely. (Mustard tastes great with baked potatoes, trust me. You need a strong flavor like this to break through the starchiness, though.) This mustard, though very strong, is surprisingly versatile. If you're a fan of good mustard, and you're bored of weak American yellow, try this well-crafted mustard out for size - you won't be disappointed.

WALROR EDIT: this doesn't have a rating so I'm gonna stick a 9 in here.

Author Edit: Upon retrospection (4/27/20), this mustard scores a solid 10 / 10!

Dijon Mustard Review - Market Basket Brand Dijon Mustard

I didn't have any other mustard, so I had to go with this. I didn't have a high quality image either. (Then ChickenPox got me a better one.) This is the okay of mustards. It was your good old spicy dijon, but the bottle really got me.

First off, we had a case of desolate mustard wasteland cap. It was crusty, and crusty is not what I want in my dijon mustard. I also had the wet mustard problem, where all the oils or something float to the top and then drip out when you go to squeeze the bottle.

Finally, the sound. Oh sweet, mustardy gods, please forgive Market Basket. Never mind the sound, some sort of alien ray mixed with pain and sadness, as it makes a kind of "sploooshuffffgush" sound. And repeats.

Anyways, the mustard was mediocre. If you can't afford fancy dijon, feel free to pick up this. And look forward to Market Basket's honey mustard review, too.

(I need more mustard.)

WALROR EDIT: yeah this stuff wasn't too great so I'm gonna put in a 4.

Aioli Mustard Review - Trader Joe's Aioli Garlic Mustard

Now here is a interesting specimen of the condiment jungle - an aioli mustard. Aioli is a condiment siring from the Provence region of southern France, made from a combination of olive oil, garlic and egg yolk with some lemon juice thrown in. This specific medley of aioli and mustard is quite the delicious condiment, if I do say so myself. It's not quite as much of a go-to mustard as others, but if a particular food does well with a garlicky flavor, it's definitely a good choice.

I've never actually had just plain old aioli by itself, but I've heard it is very much like mayonnaise, which is by no means a bad thing. Mayonnaise may be inferior to mustard, but it can still be delicious; and it isn't a stretch at all to say aioli is delicious. At least, with mustard, because I haven't had it and all... you get it.

This is a great baseline mustard for the aioli mustard world. It's nice and garlicky, has a good consistency, and a good colour to boot. I use it most during dinner with whatever I'm having; basically everything I eat already has garlic in it, so this does very nicely.

The jar itself is a little on the boring side. No interesting curves, the cap is just your normal screw-on, and so on. But the mustard itself is of very high quality, and is one you should never miss in your travels in the condiment jungle.

WALROR EDIT: this doesn't have a rating and I dunno if it should be 8 or 9, but I'm gonna go with 8.

Yellow Mustard Review - Heinz Yellow Mustard

When I first saw this mustard, I had high hopes for it. I thought "maybe Heinz has finally redeemed itself after years of heathenous ketchup making." Possibly a bit naïve, but I desperately wanted Heinz Yellow to be good. But it is here where we run into the first of only a few bad mustards. Generally speaking, it's really hard to make a bad mustard, as most of the worse ones are only mediocre, but here is where Heinz gets the job done.

This mustard does do one thing right though: the bottle. I know it's a small thing, but I always hate getting the last bits of mustard out of the squeeze bottle, (which is why I generally prefer a jar), so having the cap on the bottom makes it much easier to get it out of the bottle. It's the ease of use of a jar with the convenience of a squeeze bottle, and the way the cap is designed also means that there isn't the desolate wasteland of a cap we always describe. But that's where the good parts end.

Heinz Yellow Mustard is, to put it simply, awful. It is far too sour, almost to the point of being inedible, and is just disgusting all around. The coloring of the mustard makes it look like easy cheese. The worst part is, this mustard isn't balanced at all. Assuming this is a "strong" yellow mustard, one would try comparing this to Lakeshore Strong Irish Mustard, but this is not an accurate comparison. Heinz Yellow is sour, but the main problem is that it's only sour. There is only a tiny bit of mustard flavor and spice. It's pretty much a mustard-flavored vinegar that can squeeze. Its flavor means it isn't good on anything, and doesn't allow for use in recipes either.

I think the worst part about this mustard is that this is going to be the standard for ketchup heathens, just like alienware is the standard of PCs for console peasants. I've seen the big packages of 2 heinz ketchups, a heinz mustard, and a heinz relish. I've even seen this mustard at quite a few barbecues as well. No matter how easy it is to get, no matter how convenient it is, do not pick up this mustard, you'll be glad you didn't.

WALROR EDIT: 0/10 heinz is evil

Yellow Mustard Review - Lakeshore Strong Irish Mustard

This here mustard is another of my preferred mustards for daily use. This yellow mustard (it's not really that much of a 'yellow' yellow mustard though, but I'll elaborate on that later) has a powerful punch that wakes up one's palette in a jiffy, as the name alludes to. It'll tear your previous beliefs on an Irish mustard to flitters, ya gobdaw!

The mustard is obviously quite smooth, as can be seen through the stout glass jar favored by Lakeshore for its many kinds of mustard. Having a more mellow texture like this allows the mustard to perform well across the board, primarily on sandwiches, as a dip and with meats. However, this is where the mustard's mellow nature ends. Hidden behind this seemingly friendly yellow colour is a kraken of a mustardy flavor! Be sure to use this condiment in smaller amounts than your usual yellow mustards; when I first encountered this ferocious predator of the condiment jungle, I was unaware of it's 'strong' aspect until I had a tablespoon of the stuff on my tongue. Not the best way to be introduced, but it won me back over quickly.

The defining characteristic of a yellow mustard is the fact that it contains turmeric, a mellow but down-to-earth-tasting spice, which creates the bright yellow colour. Despite the fact that Lakeshore's Strong Irish Mustard likely contains turmeric for it's telltale colour, it is wildly unlike other yellows like French's in it's taste. It would likely be better to call this mustard an English mustard, for it's taste, but for now we'll still refer to it as yellow. Yellow or not, this mustard is one to look out for in your travels.

WALROR EDIT: This stuff looks pretty good, so an 8 should be alright.

Dijon Mustard Review - Grey Poupon Dijon Mustard (With Recipe for Honey Mustard)

Ah, Grey Poupon. Much like Ingelhoffer, we have no idea what it means, it's not gray, and the name does make it sound disgusting. But ah, is it versatile. It's one of the first dijon mustards, and is smooth like yellow mustard, yet more complex like stone ground mustard. It comes in (more recently) a fairly basic oblong squeeze bottle, but is more commonly found in a neat glass jar, and it always seems like mustard tastes better out of the jar. It also means that you don't get a desolate wasteland of a cap, even though you have to use a knife.


I'm quite a fan of this mustard. It has a fine white wine flavor (as advertised on the jar), and a nice "bite" of spice at the end, without much spice before, but still keeps that quintessential mustard taste, although it is a bit more acidic than I generally like. It's my favorite kind of "regular" mustard (I'll expand on that later), as it has a nice surprise with the kick of spice, and is good on just about anything.

As I said before, Grey Poupon is my favorite kind of "regular" mustard. By this I don't mean that all mustards are the same, I just try to use that to differentiate honey mustard from the regular mustard taste found with most other varieties of mustard. What happens when I don't have any honey mustard laying around? Simple! Grey Poupon has me covered, as I just make some honey mustard with it (versatility in a nutshell). If you want to make it, it's really not hard. Simply take a small cup, put some Grey Poupon (the squeezable kind works a bit better here for ease of use) in it, and pour in about an equivalent amount of honey, and mix it until combined. It's a bit thinner than the stuff you'd find in a bottle, and couldn't really be squeezed that well, but man is it delicious. Besides, by being thinner, this means you can also use it for easy dipping, and even as salad dressing, allowing you to eat your mustard on even more foods.

WALROR EDIT: This seems like a solid 7 poupons.

Yellow Mustard Review - French's Classic Yellow

As our first review on Hard Yellow, we're starting with the classic cookout condiment, yellow mustard. This kind of mustard, the kind commonly encountered out in the condiment wilderness, is truly a masterpiece. Imagine a world, with no mustard. Just ketchup. Disgusting.

Classic Yellow mustard is a rather classic example of yellow mustard. So classic that it is, in fact, yellow. Not only is this mustard yellow, but it is also classic! Anyways, this mustard is a work of art. It tastes like what mustard should taste like: mustard. A little on the vinegary side, but that's to be expected from a both yellow and French's mustard.
The main problem is that weird crusty mustard rings around the cap that the mustard comes out of, which is a common problem with any kind of yellow mustard; without extreme care and maintenance of one's squeezable bottle, the cap will become a desolate wasteland. But not all can be perfect. Overall, it's pretty okay.

WALROR EDIT: Pox did a re-review so I'm not gonna give this a rating.

we didn't get paid for this i swear