The Spice of Life – Hot Sauce, Salsa, etc.

Discussion in 'Food and Drink' started by Syzygy, Jan 12, 2019.

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  1. Cspirou

    Cspirou They call me Sparky

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    Forgot to mention that I have a garden now and I've started growing some cayenne and scotch bonnet peppers from seeds I've saved. Don't actually know how they will turn out in this climate, but you never know.

    A sort of generic recipe is to char onions, garlic, tomatoes and peppers in a pan or grill. Then blend everything with salt and lime juice. I've discovered that roasting the peppers whole without cutting the ends off decreases the likelihood of fumigating yourself.
     
  2. penguins

    penguins Friend, formerly known as fp627

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    ^ Secret Aardvark and Heartbeat hot sauces are awesome. Really like how much flavor they get into the sauce yet all the flavor seems to highlight the chilis + make food taste great.

    Also what Cspirou is saying - leave the peppers whole (or cut them up while still fresh) to avoid fumigating self. I've made that mistake before too by only cutting the ends off when cooking down and crushing semi-aged/dried chilis to add in while it was cooking - had to sit outside for 4 hours with windows open + fans on.

    And lastly yes, Lao Gan Ma is a great product and I'm not even a huge fan of most Chinese type chili oils / pastes.
     
  3. spwath

    spwath Hijinks master cum laudle

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    So I made this. Had some problems.

    First, I forgot a bag at the grocery store, had to go back.
    Second, I didn't have a blender or food processor, so did a lot of hand mixing and cutting.
    Third, I thought: These two peppers are so small, that wont be hot. Ill put in 3.

    Finally completed. Its good. Very hot, but good. Not tooo too hot, but hotter than I expected. Makes sense for using 3 peppers I guess.
     
  4. Cspirou

    Cspirou They call me Sparky

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    glad you liked it! The classic way of doing salsa is with a mortar & pestle or molcajete. I don't have one with me, but once I do it's no more blender
     
  5. will_f

    will_f Friend

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    This thread reminds me of the one time I tried to make hot sauce from scotch bonnet peppers. It didn’t go well. I sliced up about a pound of the peppers and put them in a frying pan to char them, which filled the house with burning, choking fumes. It was pretty much exactly the same as the time my wife dropped a can of pepper spray In the entryway and it started spraying. My roommates and dogs were driven out of the house. My nose and eyes were running like crazy. About then my hands started burning from slicing up the peppers without gloves, so I went to the bathroom to wash my face, hands, and take a pee. I washed my hands first , then I peed. I realized about half way through the pee that I should have washed my hands MUCH more thoroughly. It felt like I lit my junk on fire and tried to put it out with battery acid. Unbelievably painful and I couldn’t wear underwear or pants for about an hour. After that I tried to wash my face with a wet washcloth. Turns out that didn’t work so well either- I managed to wipe some of it into my eyes. It was bad enough that I looked like I had been doing non-stop bong hits when I went to work the next day. In the end, I made some impressively good hot sauce, but I haven’t tried it again.
     
    Last edited: Jun 7, 2020
  6. Cspirou

    Cspirou They call me Sparky

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    Probably wouldn't have made much of a difference. I have washed my hands very thoroughly and I still get the same experience. Preventative measures are really all that works for really spicy peppers. There could be something that works that I haven't tried yet like using milk or vegetable oil.
     
  7. crazychile

    crazychile Eastern Iowa's Spiciest Pepper

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    I’ll make the warning again as I did in a past post.... Cook this stuff OUTSIDE when using Habaneros and other super hot Chiles. This stuff does turn into tear gas. I have a gas grille with a burner where I make sauces on the patio. But I think getting gassed is a rite of passage that everyone needs to learn once...
     
  8. JohnCarter17

    JohnCarter17 Facebook Friend

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    OK, so I am, don't do ghost and really hot sauces, I don't have an interest in things that are about heat and not flavor. We planted some fresno chiles, I want to see what they are like.

    The most interesting recent hot sauce purchases I have made were inspired by Hot Ones episodes. Humble House. These are 2 great tasting sauces with good heat.

    [​IMG]

    The Pepper Plant is a nice peppery sauce with great flavor but a bit too much sauce. The GF son brought a bottle over, and then I discovered I could get a half gallon via Amazon.

    [​IMG]

    Here is a better shot of the one on the right. I didn't know about the Lao Gan Ma Spicy Chili Crisp. Next time I will look for it. This is a similar great topping, for lots of things.
     
  9. Cspirou

    Cspirou They call me Sparky

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    ^I actually have that Humble House Guajillo. Not very spicy but a nice smoky taste.

    I'm also not too interested in stupid amounts of heat, but I do like my food to be authentic. I can't have a mild jerk chicken and same goes for certain indian curries.
     
  10. spwath

    spwath Hijinks master cum laudle

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    I had a stirring spoon, a glass tupperware bowl, and a not that sharp knife. I made it work though, just a bit chunky.

    I avoided fumigating myself, as my house has a whole house fan right near the kitchen, so turned that on, opened the window, and there was a strong breeze going through the kitchen, taking any hot pepper air away.
     
  11. roscoeiii

    roscoeiii Acquaintance

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    I'm a big fan of that Lao Gan Ma with Mushrooms. A nice complement to the chili crisp, which is everything they say it is.
     
  12. CEE TEE

    CEE TEE MOT: NITSCH

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    Bought some Lao Gan Ma for the family- if they like it, I'll grab the mushroom version too. Thanks All!
     
  13. penguins

    penguins Friend, formerly known as fp627

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    Looking for my next hot sauces - and need recommendations - hopefully all the online and boutique hot sauces come back in stock sooner than later.

    2 or 3 fruit based ones
    1 chocolate based one that isn't mole or just spicy chocolate
    1 representative of, synonymous with, or at least inspired by some type of broadly-African cuisine excluding north African and Ethiopian, which I'm already decently familiar with - yes I realize Africa is big and there are a lot of different cuisines, but I'm sure there are some commonalities somewhere, just like other regional stuff.
    1 with a strong umami flavor, or if this is not available, one that incorporates a lot of sundried tomatoes.

    Generally prefer between 4 and 7 spicy for most of my food - based on the average hot sauce shop's scale. Will down to 2 if it doesn't feel like a waste of money adding vinegar to my food or up to 8.5 on occasion. Also generally prefer less vinegary hot sauces but there are exceptions.
     
  14. JohnCarter17

    JohnCarter17 Facebook Friend

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    Here are 2 more I ordered, inspired after a Hot Ones episode.
    But I haven't opened them yet.
    I have been on a quest to use up stuff I have, before opening new stuff.

    Honestly, there is a bunch of stuff I should just toss out ....



    [​IMG]
     
  15. Syzygy

    Syzygy Friend

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    Haven't tasted these yet, just saw them at the store. I'll be trying them over the summer and will report back.

    Nice to see some hot peppers represented.
    IMG_20200620_154733.jpg
     
  16. Syzygy

    Syzygy Friend

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    I bought the Trinidad Scorpion first. It's quite vinegary to my taste, with lime overtones, and yes it's hot. Hotter than the Mrs. Renfro's Ghost Pepper salsa that I love. I'd liken it most to Tobasco™ sauce, with obviously more spice. Quite surprising for a sauce made by a Des Moines company!

    So, because of the high vinegary flavor, it's not really my preference. If my wife could eat sauces this hot, she'd prolly like it since she likes the vinegary stuff.
     
  17. dark_energy

    dark_energy Friend

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    Lingham's Chilli Sauce is quite good. Properly spicy and slight sweet flavor. I usually do not like sweet but this is subtle and works well.
     
  18. spwath

    spwath Hijinks master cum laudle

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    Just got this in from australia after almost 2 months.
    Not sure I am ready. The 2x spicy hot was very very hot. Ill see how this is...
    [​IMG]
     
  19. daduy

    daduy Acquaintance

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    May the force be with you
     
  20. YMO

    YMO Chief Fun Officer

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