I made some hot pepper sauce, yesterday – emphasis on the word hot!
It’s pretty spectacular, if you like that sort of thing – and we both do!
Our niece, Christine, started a slew of plants from seed and handed them out to the family. We got numerous peppers, tomatoes, and eggplants to add to our garden this year.
One pepper that just exploded is the Buena Mulata. It’s a purple heirloom cayenne pepper with a Scoville of 30,000 to 50,000. These seeem on the higher end!
They start out with a really pretty purple flower, and as they grow, they start off a pale greenish yellow color, but then turn bright purple. Once they begin to ripen, the peppers turn orange, then brown, and finally to a deep crimson red. The colors are striking!
I gathered about 4 ounces of peppers and started to make a vinegar-based hot sauce. It’s a really quick recipe and only takes about 30 minutes from start to bottling.
You can use this for just about any hot pepper.
Hot Pepper Sauce
- 4 oz chopped hot peppers
- 1 medium, carrot, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, chopped
- 1 shallot, chopped
- 1 cup distilled white vinegar
- 1/2 tsp sweet paprika
- 1/2 tsp oregano
- S&P to taste
- water, as necessary, to thin
Add all of the ingredients to a small pot and bring to a boil.
Reduce heat and simmer, covered, for about 15 minutes, or until all of the ingredients have softened.
Transfer to a blender and blend until smooth.
Add water a bit at a time and process to desired thickness.
Strain, if desired.
Bottle and enjoy.
The carrot acts as the sugar. You can omit and add a quarter-cup, or so. It’s also a pepper-forward recipe. It’s hot. It’s also the first sauce we’ve made from a single source pepper. Usually, we make pepper sauce from a collection of different peppers. I like this one!
I got exactly 3 5 oz bottles from the recipe. A perfect amount.
Now to start thinking about tomatoes…
That’s just one of 10 plants we have going!