We make the kind of things that earn a permanent spot in the kitchen. The kind you reach for when dinner needs a lift, eggs need an upgrade, leftovers need saving, or something crispy is begging for a dip.
Our range includes fermented hot sauces and relishes, with plenty more ideas being tested in the Lab
From collecting to creating
There’s always been a slightly unreasonable amount of sauces, condiments and other good things in our fridge and pantry.
Markets, weekends away, a “you have to try this” recommendation somehow, we’d always come home with something new.
We started noticing the difference between something that was interesting for one meal and something you genuinely wanted to reach for again and again.
Before long, we weren’t just collecting the good stuff. We were experimenting with flavours of our own.
What started as a fascination with flavour became a process of making, tasting, tweaking and refining.
Taste Lab turned out to be a pretty fitting name for what we’d been doing all along.
Flavour first.
Always.
Everything we make lives by the same rule:
If it doesn’t do something differently, or better, it stays in the Lab.
That’s why we ferment the chillies for our hot sauces — building flavour, depth and complexity before we even start thinking about heat.
Even the hottest sauce in the range still has to taste incredible before it gets to be hot.
But that thinking goes well beyond hot sauce.
Whether it’s a relish, seasoning, something for the pantry or something for the kitchen, there has to be a reason for it to be there.
Everything has to earn its place.
WHO IS TASTE lAB?
We’re Jess and Jamie, and food has always been a pretty big part of how we spend our time.
We plan our days around what’s for dinner, and look forward to weekends spent around the table with our people.
Someone’s got music picked. Someone’s prepping. Someone else is “just tasting”. Half the fun happens before the food even reaches the table - the creating, tweaking, tasting and figuring out how to make something better.
That same energy has naturally found its way into Taste Lab.
There are plenty of opinions, plenty of tasting, and nothing gets through just for the sake of filling a range.
We want to make the things you add to your weeknight meals, pass around at a BBQ, put out with a cheese board - and notice when you’ve run out.
A spoonful, drizzle
or A generous swipe.
We’re not here to make food complicated. We’re here to make it better.
Taste Lab is for the quick dinners, the girl dinners, the Sunday breakfasts, the big nights around the table, the BBQs, the cheese boards, the leftovers worth saving and everything in between.
Our hot sauces and relishes are made here in New Zealand, and whatever comes out of Taste Lab has been tested, tasted and tweaked until we think it gives you a reason to reach for it again.
If it earns a spot in the range, we hope it earns a spot in your kitchen too.