The Hot Sauce thread.

Mo' Hotta, Mo' Betta. That's a slogan I can get behind. I love fiery food. Last night I told the waitress I wanted my Drunken Noodles "Thai hot." Delicious! I would gargle with Tabasco if it wasn't so expensive in those little bottles.*

What are your default hot sauces, and in what different ways do you use them?

Around Casa Silenus, the go-to sauces are Sriracha, Crystal and Frank's for spicing up just about anything. My travel bottles are Mini-Tabasco bottles. I use a lot of Tiger Sauce as a cooking ingredient, as I find it brings a depth of flavor to dishes that the others don't. If I want to seriously bring the heat, I use Blair's. Honorable Mention goes to Toad Sweat, which is just frakking outstanding over ice cream.

The rest of the collection gets used sporadically. I have over 100 bottles on the rack as a display, and maybe 25 or so in the back of the cabinet for cooking.







*I know you can buy it in gallon bottle at restaurant supply stores. Shut up.

My favorites:

Brother Bru-Bru's, perfect heat level, the garlic gives it the most well-rounded taste ever.

Blair's Death (the original), perfect salsa with chips.

North Shore Nitro, perfect with pizza and pasta. Kinda sour, but other than Tabasco it has actual heat and flavor. I got three people in my office hooked on it (and they won't find it anywhere in Germany :D ).

I grow a variety of hot peppers in my yard. Then I make pepper jelly. Thai chili jelly is my favorite so far, although I made a blueberry-cayenne-jalepeno jelly that kicked ass as well. It works great as jelly on toast or with PB, or it can be dumped over cream cheese or goat cheese and served as an appetizer spread with crusty French bread. It's also awesome as a marinade on fishes and meats.

I make my own hot sauce as well: freshly picked cayenne peppers + vinegar = chucked in a blender and then "cured" in the fridge for a couple weeks.

Generally, I don't bother with hot sauce. I chuck fresh hot pepps straight into whatever dishes I'm cooking, or use the pepper jelly as a base for a sauce. (This means I make my own salsa as well, out of whatever's ripe that day. I try to keep at least six varieties of hot peppers going at all times.)

Sriracha, all the different variations of Tabasco, and Cholula all get regular workouts at our house. There's one that we picked up by a company called Mossy Bayou makes one called Swamp Scum that is a perfect all around replacement for the regular Louisiana vinegar types, except it has a bit of smoke flavor and it's a putrid green color. Best pork marinade ever invented though.

This thread is a great idea! I re-arranged my cupboard to better showcase our collection.

Many of them are "novelty" items which we recieved as gifts. (You can see some bottles have never been opened). My standbys are Tobasco, and several Habanero sauces.

I really like Frank's w/lime.... :oops:

There is only one hot sauce: Marie Sharp's Habanero Pepper Sauce






...and Taco Bell's Hot Sauce now that it's available in a bottle.

TWO!

There are only two hot sauces: Marie Sharp's Habanero Pepper Sauce and Taco Bell's Hot Sauce now that it's available in a bottle.






...and the soy wasabi mustard sauce I make at home.

THREE!

I'll come in again...

My favorite, that I unfortunately can't find around here very easily is Scorned Woman Hot Sauce. Dark, smoky, and oh so hot.

My favorite is Sontava XXX Habanero Sauce. It's got enough heat, but you can put a few squirts on your taco without it becoming inedible, and it has an awesome habanero flavor.

I recently got one called "100% Pain" sauce and I can barely eat it. Just a tiny drop of it will have my whole mouth burning and my head sweating. I think it has added pure capsacin in it.

The rack.

I guess I'm boring—I'm just a Tabasco guy.

1) El Yucateco Kutbil-ik de Chile Habanero (Mayan recipe habanero salsa)
2) El Yucateco Red habanero salsa
3) El Yucateco Caribbean
3) Golden Mountain Sriraja Panich
4) Tabasco
5) Nando's Medium Peri-peri
6) Frank's (for wings and the like)
7) Cholula
8) Valentina

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Originally posted by pulykamell

2) El Yucateco Red habanero salsa
7) Cholula
8) Valentina

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The El Yucateco was my favorite for a long time. I think I liked the green slightly better. I first encountered it at Cafe Brazil. Unfortunately, my local store does not carry El Yucateco so I tried the Sontava and like it as well. Sontava is thinner and a little chunky, while the El Yucateco was smoother.

Cholula is also awesome, but it doesn't seem to have any heat at all to me anymore since I've become accustomed to habanero sauces.

My wife loves Valentina, but I don't care for it. I think she eats it with Cheetos or something.

I'm not a real connoi....conosi....expert on hot sauces, and don't like my mouth burned, so I usually stick to Louisiana (brand) or Tapatio. For more fire, I use Sembal Oelek chili paste.

I'm not quite sure how many I have at the moment. Drives my wife nuts, she doesn't understand why anybody would need more than one, or how different sauces go better with different foods.

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Originally posted by Chefguy

I'm not a real connoi....conosi....expert on hot sauces, and don't like my mouth burned, so I usually stick to Louisiana (brand) or Tapatio. For more fire, I use Sembal Oelek chili paste.

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Ha, Louisiana and Tapatio (and Cholula) are my 'exotics'. Generally I use Tabasco, Crystal and Sriracha. I'm definitely not a real...expert either, but I do like a moderate amount of burn. I blame eating Mom's chili during my childhood for that.

I have a question. Is plain adobo sauce in a bottle as good as the stuff they pack chipotle peppers in?

If I could choose only one it would original Tabasco, hands down.

Also likes - Crystal, Louisiana, Trappeys, Franks, etc.

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Originally posted by garygnu

I have a question. Is plain adobo sauce in a bottle as good as the stuff they pack chipotle peppers in?

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I have never seen bottled adobo sauce. Only peppers with sauce.

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Originally posted by Badtz Maru

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Originally posted by pulykamell

2) El Yucateco Red habanero salsa
7) Cholula
8) Valentina

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The El Yucateco was my favorite for a long time. I think I liked the green slightly better. I first encountered it at Cafe Brazil. Unfortunately, my local store does not carry El Yucateco so I tried the Sontava and like it as well. Sontava is thinner and a little chunky, while the El Yucateco was smoother.

Cholula is also awesome, but it doesn't seem to have any heat at all to me anymore since I've become accustomed to habanero sauces.

My wife loves Valentina, but I don't care for it. I think she eats it with Cheetos or something.

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I use these sauces very specifically. For example, I wouldn't use the habanero salsa on Asian food. I don't use Tabasco and similar sauces on Mexican food (I know some Mexicans do, but it tastes completely wrong to me.) For bog standard Mexican hot sauce, Valentina works. For Louisiana, Southern, and general American cooking, I find the vinegary Tabasco-type sauces to be the best match.

The green El Yucateco is supposed to be hotter than the red, but, for whatever reason, I prefer the taste of the riper, red habaneros.

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Originally posted by silenus

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Originally posted by garygnu

I have a question. Is plain adobo sauce in a bottle as good as the stuff they pack chipotle peppers in?

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I have never seen bottled adobo sauce. Only peppers with sauce.

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It exists, but I've never bought one. I'll check the market later today to see the brands. Goya also sells powdered adobo, which is basically ends up being seasoned salt.

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Originally posted by pulykamell

I use these sauces very specifically. For example, I wouldn't use the habanero salsa on Asian food. I don't use Tabasco and similar sauces on Mexican food (I know some Mexicans do, but it tastes completely wrong to me.) For bog standard Mexican hot sauce, Valentina works. For Louisiana, Southern, and general American cooking, I find the vinegary Tabasco-type sauces to be the best match.

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This is why you maintain a selection of sauces. So you can custom-tailor the taste of your food. Asian sauce on Mexican food is just wrong. To each, from each.

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Originally posted by pulykamell

The green El Yucateco is supposed to be hotter than the red, but, for whatever reason, I prefer the taste of the riper, red habaneros.

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The really hot stuff looks rather innocuously brown. Its color is quite deceptive.

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Originally posted by garygnu

I have a question. Is plain adobo sauce in a bottle as good as the stuff they pack chipotle peppers in?

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OK, I just got back from the market and saw four different brands of adobo on the shelf. La Preferida, La Costena, El Mexicano, and another brand I'm forgetting. I bought the La Costena. It's nothing like the adobo you get in the chipotle peppers, but this stuff is quite tasty. It's basically a spice paste with chiles & sesame seeds. It was not what I was expecting. It has the consistency of something like Patak's curry pastes -- where the dry ingredients settle to the bottom and the oil pools on top. It is quite yummy. The ingredient list on La Preferida's adobo was similar -- sesame and chiles mostly. I didn't get a chance to see the others. From what I understand, you cut this paste with broth or water to make a sauce.

However, adobo is also one of those foodstuffs with a lot of variation, so it's possible that there is something like the adobo in chipotle chiles out there for sale.

Cool. Thanks for the review. I'll have to check it out.

My staples are Tabasco for egg/breakfast type things, Tabasco brand chipotle just because it tastes really good, and goes on burritos well (not that hot though), Tapatio for Mexican-ish food, and Sriracha for Asian-ish food. I've also got a really big bottle of this more local brand that is like Tapatio but with more limon flavor. I've got a container of Thai hot green curry paste. You have to mix it with coconut milk so I guess it doesn't count as sauce on its own, but it'll fire you up but good.

I wish I had more time to collect lots of little bottles of various "kill you dead" sauces, but I don't. I do grow & dry my own peppers, so if I want something to become lethal, I just crunch up as much dried pepper as is needed.

I save, wash & sterilize my old Tabasco sauce bottles. My intent is to someday start experimenting with my own sauces, but so far all I've got is a bunch of empty bottles. I can dream, though.

Another favorite of mine is Thai Kitchen's Red Curry Paste. One of the chain habachi restaurants offers it (they add just a dash of coconut milk to it, to make it smooth) with their meals, and man, is it the perfect compliment to fried rice.

For the past couple weeks I've been dipping everything savory into Franks. (frinstance, chicken nuggets, arbys sandiwches, fries, burgers, etc.) But it's not so much for the hotness as for the flavor. Maybe if I can find some Scorned Woman I'd put a little into it both for the taste and hotness.

My second favorite sauce is Taco Bell's Fire Sauce. Also for the flavor. I should try dipping wings into Fire Sauce and taco bell tacos into Franks to see what they taste like.

Encona West Indian Hot Pepper Sauce.

I don't know if you get it in the States, but it's fairly common in UK supermarkets; at least it was in London.

Fuck I miss that stuff. All I can get here (Greece) is Tabasco, and it's expensive.

Update: just got Taco Bell and dipped it in Franks. It tasted really good. But next time I won't dip as half the stuffings fell into the plate. I'll have to be careful though when I pour it on next time instead because just a little too much will result in a crapload of sodium.

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Originally posted by silenus

The rack.

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Nice rack, silenus.




Someone had to say it.

I am a dedicated Tobasco Chipotle man.

I wish I could eat it like dip.

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Originally posted by deedeeknowit

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Originally posted by silenus

The rack.

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Nice rack, silenus.

Someone had to say it.

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Thank you. My wife's is nicer, but I get by. :D

http://www.insanechicken.com/Hot-Sau...-Can-Kill.html

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This Hot Sauce is so hot, you'd have to gulp 250,000 gallons of
water just to put out the fire.

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I found this on plime.com and thought of you guys.

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Most of the signed and numbered bottles of "16 Million Reserve" will be purchased by hot sauce addicts recognized as chile heads.

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Buyers have to agree to a rider cautioning that any handling "must be under a controlled environment using protective and protective eye wear".

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I second the green El Yucateco- something about the flavor of that (as opposed to the red) makes me choose it every time.

Sriracha can make even the crappiest pizza taste better.

Mezzetti's Habanero Sauce added to ketchup is just about the only thing into which I will dip my fries.

I worked at a gourmet foods store in Ohio for many years called Overbey's Emporium (Columbusers? Columbusites? Oh hell- you people from Columbus, Ohio (!) may be familiar with Overbey's) and we offered hot sauce samples every weekend in March and October (or something like that- this was at the old store in the French Market- my memory's hazy...). Anyway- this is where I learned that I love HOT. We sold over 30 varieties which included Scorned Woman, the Dave's Insanity line, the Blair's line, Mad Dog, Melinda's, Endorphin Rush, Matouk's Flambeau (man, it's good), Ass Kickin', the El Yucatecos, Tennessee Sunshine, Bru-bru's, Crystal, Sembal Oelek, Sriracha, etc, etc, etc. That was a great place to work!

Well, thanks to this thread I picked up a bottle of Valentina at the store today. We'll see if it enhances my tacos more than Tapatio does.

I wonder if anyone's started using these peppers in a commercial hot sauce yet? :shock:

Yes,and yes.

Three groups of hot sauce on my rack...

One's I bought myself:
Red El Yucateco
Chipotle Tabasco
A local doubanjian
And a local gochujang

Gifts:
Blair's After Death
Dave's Insanity Sauce
Frontera Habanero (meh)

Homemade:
a jar of my SIL's habanero jelly (yummy)
a bottle of homemade West Indian hot sauce
several bottles of koregusu sauce I made up myself (Okinawan style hot sauce) originally it's supposed to be a infusion of Korean peppers in Awamori, Okinawan white liquor. I've used various chillis and liquors. The habaneros, mangos, and vodka is quite tasty. :)

In Cameroon, every food you get- from your plate of beans at breakfast, your spaghetti omelet sandwich, your hard boiled eggs at bars, your millet-and-leaves dinner, etc- is served with a sauce simply called piment. A little metal jar of piment is as obligatory on a table (or eating mat, as it so often is) as salt and pepper is in America.

You simply grind up a ton of scotch bonnet peppers with a little bit of garlic, onions and Maggi bullion cubes (essential to all Cameroonian cooking) and then mix in a dash of key lime juice, a bunch of palm oil a couple spoonfuls of tomato paste. Saute it for a few minutes and then pack it into jars. It should keep a couple of weeks in the tropical sun.

It's unholy hot. Which is great for making it possible to choke down some of Africa's less appetizing cuisine. I've choked down more than one porcupine lunch thanks to the power of piment. And with some dishes it is borderline sublime. There is nothing quite like deep fried sweet potatoes with piment.

Damn that piment sounds good. So is the final consistency that of a sauce or a paste? I wanna make me some.

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Originally posted by pulykamell

Damn that piment sounds good. So is the final consistency that of a sauce or a paste? I wanna make me some.

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This. I'm so going to make some over Spring Break.

If someone comes up with a piment recipe that includes measures, please do.

I just gave it a shot. We'll see how it comes out. Unfortunately, I don't have any frame of reference for what this sauce is supposed to taste like.

Is there any other name this sauce goes by? Because I can't even seem to find a basic recipe for piment on the internet. Every mention of piment and Cameroon is to the peppers themselves. And what kind of Maggi is used? Chicken? Beef? And should the final sauce have a cooked taste, rather than a raw taste? Is it passed through a mesh to get a smooth, liquid product, or is it more of chunky sauce or even a paste?

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Originally posted by evensven

It's unholy hot. Which is great for making it possible to choke down some of Africa's less appetizing cuisine. I've choked down more than one porcupine lunch thanks to the power of piment.

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The fuck? Porcupine?

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Originally posted by pulykamell

And what kind of Maggi is used? Chicken? Beef?

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I was wondering that too. I was just at the store, but the only Maggi is in the Latino section and comes in either tomato or chicken flavor.

Loooooovvve Hot sauce, particularly cultivated in one of the US hot sauce belts, the NOLA vector; where Louisiana hot sauces are on every restaurant table from New Orleans to Memphis to, oh, about halfway through Alabama. Texas is it's own Mex influenced vector, a bit different in taste and history. My initial hot sauce palate was from being in California at a young age, so Mexican influenced, plus time spent in Mexico as a kid. Hope y'all can bear with me here.

In moving to Mississippi from NC in the 90's, having been limited to to the awful gummy bland NC Texas Pete sauce, damn glad to find real hot sauce on every restaurant table: usually Crystal or Louisiana. Big ol' bottles were cheap at 60 cents, Tabasco always available from the kitchen, easy, as well as a Sport pepper sauce(green peppers and vinegar) for greens. That was normal eating.

In 2000, moved back to NC, and, in Chapel Hill, at the gourmet stores, there is an amazing plethora of hot sauces, excellent bajillions, and they sell well here. But, there is *generally* not hot sauce as a matter of course on every table, except in the now good and well multiplying Mexican restaurants. When first moving back, I asked for hot sauce at breakfast---gotta have it on eggs---
at a restaurant that was part of a co-op restaurant that had plenty of hot sauces for sale, but none available st the table. So, I went around the corner and bought some, because I really needed it. I assured the waitress that there wasn't any blame, but, being a refugee from the Hot Sauce belt, I had to have it. And, if they wanted to have it available, good idea, and that was a good one.

Thing is, it *was* easily available, but not in the culture to have it right on the table like ketchup, as it is in the NOLA, TX, and CA hot sauce vectors.

What I'm wondering is, with the plethora of excellent, and some downright painful, hot sauces that have exploded in the past 15 years, what's up with the Collection? My Mom does this, and my Dad; born Californians that grew up with spicy Mexican food, and have a taste for it, but both separately relocated to the South. They collect hot sauces like Scout badges, use some, but mostly love the labels, taste a bit, then display them. I'm not casting aspersions....really, it makes a great trove of gifts for me to give them, as I have a better source to choose from here in ChiChi Chapel Hill, but, it does make me wonder what the Trophy aspect of hot sauces really is. Does it correspond with hot sauce being a relative novelty in your local cuisine ?

Babbled on a good bit, and could even more, but I'd rather hear y'alls take on it.

I

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Originally posted by levdrakon

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Originally posted by pulykamell

And what kind of Maggi is used? Chicken? Beef?

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I was wondering that too. I was just at the store, but the only Maggi is in the Latino section and comes in either tomato or chicken flavor.

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My guess is it really doesn't matter. Looking online, all the Cameroonian recipes I could find just refer to it as generic Maggi cubes. I'm guessing chicken will do fine. I'm more familiar with liquid Maggi, which is a soy-sauce/wheat-gluten type flavoring liquid that smells a bit like lovage (in fact, the Germans call lovage Maggikraut [Maggi herb]), but that's obviously not what's called for in this recipe.

I think I know it (my g/f is from Cameroon), so let me fill in:

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Originally posted by pulykamell

Is there any other name this sauce goes by? Because I can't even seem to find a basic recipe for piment on the internet.

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Asian chili oil may come close.

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Originally posted by pulykamell

And what kind of Maggi is used? Chicken? Beef?

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This one.

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Originally posted by pulykamell

And should the final sauce have a cooked taste, rather than a raw taste? Is it passed through a mesh to get a smooth, liquid product, or is it more of chunky sauce or even a paste?

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That depends on if it should be preserved or served immediately. It may also depend on the region of Cameroon. The hottest piment I've had was basically a large quantity of red peppers cooked in vegetable oil until they're dissolved.

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Originally posted by Alien Crouton

The fuck? Porcupine?

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They're very common in central Africa. There's not much left if you remove the spines and the taste isn't very exciting.

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Originally posted by kk fusion

Asian chili oil may come close.

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Oh, I've had and made that stuff, and it's awesome. But evensven's description sounded like something else, with the lime, onions, garlic, Scotch bonnets, etc. And Asian chile oil is generally made with dried red peppers.

That Maggi you linked to, judging by the ingredient list, sounds like a dry version of the Maggi sauce I mentioned upthread, rather than the Maggi chicken stock cubes you get here in the States. I'm going to have to try with the liquid Maggi and see what happens....