Peppers and I have a very love-hate relationship. Mostly hate. To begin with, I’m a wuss when it comes to spicy foods. This is a huge disappointment to my dad, because our family is from China’s Hunan Province, which is known for it’s spicy cuisine. It absolutely kills him that any time he cooks for me, he has to leave out all the peppers or I won’t eat it. (The man is a pepper fiend – I’ve seen him eat it on ICE CREAM. Yuck.)
And, the two times we’ve gone back to visit our hometown, I’ve have to pick out all the peppers and dip all my food in tea (like a raccoon) to rinse off some of the spices before I can eat it. This, of course, horrified my relatives (“What are you doing???? You’re losing all the flavor!”) and embarrassed the hell out of my Dad. No one will ever let me live that down.
My favorite pepper memory, however, is the time I made jalapeno poppers and accidentally got some pepper juices on my face. Genius that I am, I decided to wash my hands with some water and then splash it on my face to get that cleaned off too. Of course, capsaicin (which makes peppers spicy) is oily and floats on water, so all I accomplished was to get it spread all over my face.
It took about 3 seconds for my world to light on fire – the capsaicin was in my eyes, in my nostrils, on my lips…I couldn’t open my eyes because they were burning and watering uncontrollably, and it felt like every part of my face was being stung endlessly by a swarm of giant, murderous hornets. I was literally screaming and ugly-crying from the pain. Dan, thinking I was being murdered in the bathroom, came running.
To combat the pain, I tried a bunch of stuff. Scrubbing frantically at my face with soap only made things worse, because my face was already so sensitive. Dan read that dairy products were supposed to help, so I tried pouring buttermilk on my face. Nothing. So we moved on to Greek yogurt. That helped, but not for long. So then I tried dunking my face in a bowl of ice water. Again, it helped, but only for like 30 seconds.
In the end, I spent about an hour hunched over my bathroom sink, alternating between smearing handfuls of yogurt on my face and dunking my head in ice water. Crying and moaning and drooling the whole time. It wasn’t my finest moment.
After all that, I’m definitely a little gun shy around peppers. When I make jalapeno poppers now, I lean wayyyyyy back from the chopping board. Can’t go through that again. But I can’t avoid them completely, because I’m married to a man who loves them. And, for a second summer in a row, this man grew a bunch of habaneros, jalapenos, and spicy bells on our balcony.
Last year’s crop went to waste, because I didn’t know what to do with them (and/or did not want to deal with them). This year, I was determined to turn them into something delicious (for him), ‘cuz he was so excited about his crop and asked me constantly what I was going to make with them. Hot sauce seemed like the way to go – I couldn’t think of any other use for them, and there were so many peppers to deal with that I figured I’d share the wealth. It is almost holiday season after all.
The habanero hot sauce scared me a little bit, because the steam coming off the pot while I was cooking it was super intense. It actually made the air in the kitchen and living room spicy. I only tried a little bit of it, and it tasted like liquid fire to me. But, both my coworker and Dan’s coworker (who gave us the plant), who were each gifted a bottle, said it wasn’t too bad. They were actually able to get past the heat and taste the other flavors of the sauce. Go figure. As for the Sriracha – it was spicy, but noticeably less so than the habanero sauce. I could actually taste the underlying flavors, and it was pretty good! Hot and tangy, with just a little bit of sweetness, and little umami thanks to the fish sauce. Definitely tasty – we kept a bottle for ourselves.
If you have any spice/hot sauce lovers in your lives, a few bottles of these would be a great holiday gift! Give them a try – they’re super easy! Before you ask…
- Bottles – 5oz Hot Sauce Clear Dasher Bottles
(would be great for DIY extracts and oils too!)
- Labels – Avery Removable Multi-Use Labels, Kraft Brown, 1.125 x 2.25 Inches, Pack of 24 (40151)
- 12 orange habanero chiles, stems removed
- ½ cup roughly chopped carrot
- ½ cup chopped onion
- 5 garlic cloves, unpeeled
- 1 cup apple cider vinegar
- 1 cup water
- 2 tsp salt
- ¼ tsp sugar
- 20-25 jalapeno peppers (mix of green/red), stemmed, seeded and roughly chopped
- 3 garlic cloves, peeled and smashed
- ⅓ cup apple cider vinegar
- 3 tbsp tomato paste
- 3 tbsp honey
- 2 tbsp fish sauce
- 1-½ tsp salt
- In a dry pan at medium heat, roast your garlic, turning occasionally to toast and blacken on all sides.
- In a medium saucepan, add the carrot, onion, habanero, vinegar and water and bring to a simmer.
- Cook for 10-20 minutes until the carrots are tender.
- Put everything into a blender, including the (peeled) garlic, salt, and sugar. Blend until very very smooth.
- Feel free to strain the sauce to get out the thickest pulp and the seeds. Adjust with water to your desired consistency. Allow mixture to cool.
- Pour hot sauce into jars, and seal. (I poured mine into 5oz hot sauce bottles. I got 2 full bottles and a partially filled third bottle.)
- Keep refrigerated!
- Place all the ingredients in a blender (or food processor), purée until very smooth (there should be no visible bits or chunks).
- Pour the pureed mixture into a medium saucepan and bring to a boil over medium-high heat.
- As soon as it starts boiling, reduce the heat to low so that it is just barely simmering.
- Cook for 30 to 35 minutes, stirring every now and then. The sauce will thicken and the foam will subside as it cooks.
- Once cooked, take your pot off the heat and allow to cool slightly.
- Transfer the sauce to jars or bottles (I just barely filled two 5oz bottles).
- Keep refrigerated!
- Keep in the fridge.
(Ricky Bayless’s Habanero Hot Sauce recipe, originally seen on Foodie Arsenal; Sriracha recipe very slightly adapted from The Iron You)
I’ve never tried sriracha sauce, but from what I hear it’s amazingly good! This DIY recipe is amazing for me, definitely going to be making a batch very soon! Thank you so much for sharing!
Thanks for reading! If you try it, hope you like it 😀
Bahahahahaha – That’s an amazing story. My least favorite is when I accidentally touch my eye after cutting peppers – WHYYYYYYYY?! I am such a spice wuss too. This sounds like a great holiday gift for Lucas’s dad;) And I love your labels, duh.
Oh man that SUCKS! I bet that burned like crazy. Dan literally will not let me come near him after I’ve cut peppers 🙁
Sugar wash
These are amazing!! I love how easy it is to make your own versions of hot sauce! I am so trying!
😀 😀 Hope you like them!
I love your stories! I am a total wuss when it comes to hot sauce too. I make my husband taste anything potentially hot before getting the OK to eat it. Most of the time though, it turns out too spicy for me so I don’t get to eat it. I love your story of rinsing your food in tea! I totally would have done that too (or starved because I might not have thought of that!). 😀
Glad to hear I’m not alone as spice wuss! 😉
Trying this soon!! Love the colors!
Thanks!
Reading your story just felt like hearing myself. I grew up in Hungary, where everything is full of spicy peppers. And I also struggle eating anything hot….
But my SO is also crazy about hot peppers and he also started to grow his own ones, so this recipe is just so amazing for me! I will surprise him with these sauces, thanks 🙂
I hope your SO likes the sauces!
Your story about being in the bathroom slathering yogurt on yourself is hilarious. Sad, but funny to read about (sorry!). There’s definitely been several times that I cooked with hot peppers and touched my eyes before washing my hands thoroughly. My fiance now ALWAYS tells me to wash my hands whenever I cook anything spicy.
It’s so cool of you to make hot sauce for your husband 🙂
I have a bunch of hot peppers from our CSA, maybe I’ll try to make some hot sauce out of them, because we certainly won’t get through them all otherwise!
Haha it’s OK, once my face/eyes stopped burning I was able to appreciate the ridiculousness of the situation too 😉 Good luck with your CSA peppers…I don’t envy you the task of getting through them all!!!
This is amazing!!!! Loved your jalapeno popper story! We all definitely have one of those stories, trust me! I’ve done it before too 🙂 A painful lesson to learn…
And totally loving this hot sauce action! They are beautiful… pinning!
SUCH a painful lesson….
OMG, I have BIG TEARS OF LAUGHTER RUNNING DOWN MY FACE right now after reading your pepper story of getting it on your face. I just read it to my husband and started laughing and crying all over again! Thanks for the great laugh, forgive me…I do sympathize with you because we have all done it…but your explanation was an A+!!
Haha, laughing at my pain, I see!!! It’s ok, now that the sting/burn is a distant memory, I can laugh about it too…
What is the heat level on the habanero hot sauce?
It’s hard for me to answer that b/c I think it sort of depends on your spice tolerance. I’m a wuss when it comes to spicy things, so for me it was like tasting liquid fire. But, my friend Ted, who is a hot sauce addict, just said that it had a little kick to it. Does that help??
What about a scale from 1 being mild or 10 being atomic? How about based on Buffalo Wild Wings sauces?
Never been to Buffalo Wild Wings, so I’m not sure. For me I think this would be at least an 8 on that scale, but someone who is better with spicy foods might go lower than that. BUT, for better reference, habaneros are pretty high on the Scoville scale – Wikipedia says they are among the 4th spiciest peppers in the world (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoville_scale#Peppers). So I think it’s safe to say that hot sauce made with habaneros is pretty frickin’ spicy 🙂
have you every tried canning this recipe?
I have not – but I could see that working well. Let me know if you try it!
Making this habenero sauce as we speak, where did you get the bottles?
I got the bottles off of Amazon – the link should be at the bottom of the post, right above the recipe box.
Are there any kind of health risks to worry about when making this (botulism)? I saw that on another site for making flavored oils and wasn’t sure if it was only for oil since I didn’t see any warning when looking for homemade vanilla/lemon/orange/mint extracts with vodka. I just don’t want to hurt/kill and family members 😉
I think with any of these homemade sauces, extracts, oils, etc. (which don’t contain preservatives), there is always a risk of botulism if you don’t store them properly. The extracts are probably the least risky, b/c they’ve got citrus AND alcohol, both of which help with preservation and sterilizing. The oils are the most risky, if you’re using fresh herbs vs. dried, b/c that stuff breaks down over time – so you have to store everything in the fridge and use it up quickly. These sauces, I think, because you’re cooking everything over high heat + there is citrus in both, have a lower risk of botulism as long as you store them properly. If/when you give these away to family members, just be sure to tell them to keep the bottles in the fridge, and to use the sauces sooner rather than later. Hope this helps!
Such a cool recipe! Quick question, how far in advance can these sauces be made? Or how long will they keep in the fridge?
If you keep them refrigerated, these hot sauces should last up to 2 weeks. Definitely check the bottles regularly though, to see if the sauces start to get nasty sooner than that!
Thanks for the idea. Made it and they are amazing. I love spicy food and with chicken or pizza, these are great.
Seems to me you should give credit where it is due. This is Rick Baylis’ recipe for habanero sauce.
Hi John! Thanks for your comment. You are correct, the original recipe for my habanero sauce is from Rick Bayless. Please note that at the time of this posting, I had credited “The Foodie Arsenal” with the habanero sauce recipe, because that is where I stumbled across the recipe. As I recall, in her post, she credited Rick Bayless. Unfortunately, it appears that the Foodie Arsenal blog is no longer active (the domain has expired). So, I have now updated the credits section to link to Rick Bayless’ page. Thanks for bringing this to my attention!
Made the Sriracha recipe a couple of days ago from jalapenos out of my garden. I made a double batch with about 60 or so smaller jalapenos.
I’m a huge fan of Sriracha in the first place, but this recipe just made it impossible for me to buy it from the store again, it’s THAT good!
Thanks very much 🙂
Cheers
Martin in Oz
PS. Got a bowl of chocolate habanero I’m about to make into your other recipe, can’t wait!
I’m so glad you liked the recipe!!!! How did the other one turn out with the chocolate habaneros??