Summary

 

Hot Sauce Comes to an End-but the smell in my garage does not!

 

I did not get any pictures for the last steps in my project because I have a broken ankle and it took a lot more energy to squeeze the peppers for all the juice they had:-) one of my cans molded over at day 12, but the other one I began squeezing at day 10. My suggestion to everyone is maybe a little more sea salt to help control the mold if you are doing this in the summer months.

 

With the jar of fermented peppers that was mold free, I got a strainer with very small holes so that no chunks of peppers can fall through. You put a bowl under the strainer to catch the juice from the pepper pulp. Wear gloves! I learned my lesson from skipping this step when cutting the peppers. Once gloved dump the peppers into the strainer, and begin pushing until you feel all the juice you can get has been squeezed out. This juice is the base of the pepper sauce!! Once you have this you can season to taste. I personally used vinegar.....and my boyfriend to taste test as o went along and added little by little until it was how I wanted. Vinegar does help tame the very hot selection of peppers that I used.

 

Overall, I had  lot of fun with this project and I think if given more time I could continue to trial and error until I had a good technique and mixture down. The great thing is that it can be as mild as you want or as hot as you want, it all depend on the peppers you start with! I may actually try again, although I did love my final product (I love hot stuff) I am curious to try it with the more conventional Cheyenne peppers that are found in franks hot sauce, they are just tough to find in this area:-) This stuff is great-but the wicked bite at the end is pretty intense and can only be used in moderation for the spicy fanatics out there! Thanks for following!:-)

 

Ps. A few tips for those who may try this:

--Wear gloves! Do not touch your face...... it burns! The juices from these fresh cut hotties is intense!

--Use more salt if doing in the summer, the heat seemed to speed up the action and allow for more mold if longer fermenting is desired

--Pick a place-out of smelling range to allow pepper-mash to ferment. It needs to be a place with relative climate control, however, the smell lingers for days and days even after it is finished!! My garage smells repulsive! Also, this smell doesn't mean it has gone bad, my sauce tasted great- peppers fermenting is just pretty intense! :-)

Smelly Pepper

 

Smelly Peppers- Day 8

 

Today I noticed the smell more than I have prior and I did manage talking my wonderful boyfriend into tasting the 'sauce'. He didn't fall over, faint, or get sick so I have high hopes for the final project. The color has also changed from the original green color to a more reddish-brown as well as one of the 4 jars has a little bit of mold growing just on the top. I have read and researched because this was my fear, and everywhere I have seen, watched, or listened to says that I can scrape it off and everything below it is fine. The end product is me squishing the vegetables and essentially juicing the pulp anyways, so I'm just using the peppers and microbes for their goods and the mold wouldn't hurt anyways. :-)

 

 

In case you were all just DYING to see my moldy, extremely stinky, pepper pulp- I took a picture for you.....aren't you so lucky?

 

 

 

 

The best part is threatening the kids this will be dinner if they don't behave ;-)

There is bubbling!

 

Day 3

 

On day 2 I didn't notice much except the strong pepper spray scent in my kitchen still lingering. On day 3, bubbling began and there was a noticeable difference. It has begun fermenting and separating the juices at the bottom and the microbes working hard at the top. The smell has also begun to simmer down a bit and is much more bearable and can only be smelled when walking near the jar itself. The garlic seems to be overpowering the scent a bit- which I am okay with!

Day 1

 

Day 1 

 

I began fermenting round one of my homemade hot sauce last  night. I have been struggling to find the type of pepper that I had intended to use as my main pepper in the recipe so I decided to make my first round one of basically a- very, very hot selection of peppers with a few more mild ones.

 I used:

2 large poblano

2 large italian

 Multiple little orange habanero

Multiple little green habanero

7 jalapeno

Multiple small sweet peppers- red, yellow, and orange

 

Step 1: Wash your vegetables!



 

 

Step 2: Enlist your trusty helper who is learning to use a knife VERY safely to remove all the stems and caps of the peppers

 

Step 3: Begin to blend/process/chop your peppers into a mush/paste

 

Step 4: For every 4.5 cups of pasted peppers, add approx. 1 Tsp of salt to assist in protecting the fermentation from bad bacteria. Be careful not to add to much as it can slow the fermentation process.

 

Step 5: Mix in salt to paste

 

Step 6: Divide paste into jars (avoid plastic as chemicals can leach). Leave plenty of room for bubbling as it can expand up more than we think. Suggestions said to use cheese cloth for the top to allow the peppers to breath but protect from dust etc. I unfortunately could not find cheese cloth, so I used a coffee filter:-)

 

Things I noticed: Take all warnings to wear gloves.....SERIOUSLY! ...and in fact, I would suggest a mask if using a variety that consists of habanero and jalapeno because I felt like I got hit with pepper spray when I opened up that blender! My kitchen could not be entered by even the bravest without a scarf wrapped around their nose and mouth for at least 2 hours..... which means that I was the one getting drinks and snacks from the kitchen...for the next 2 hours:-)  My local farmers market opens on Thursdays so I will be on the hunt for batch two once I locate the aloof Cheyenne peppers!

 

Stay tuned- I will check back in for new findings...

Welcome

 

Welcome

 

Hello All,

 

As I grew up I have always loved things bitter and spicy even as a infant I would be gumming a dill pickle and my love for spicy things has grown and matured with me. One of my favorite meals is a simple buffalo wings which originated in Buffalo, New York at the Anchor Bar in 1964. Buffalo wings actually happened because the mother of the house, Teressa Bellissimo, was faced with a mistake and a last minute decision to do something with the chicken wings (normally thrown away or reserved for stock) that came instead of the backs and necks that were ordered to make spaghetti sauce. The patrons were buying drink after drink and the son, Dominic reported to the New Yorker reporter in 1980 that they wanted to do something nice for them at midnight when the mostly catholic patrons would be able to eat meat again, so Teresa deep fried the wings and dipped them in cayenne hot sauce and vinegar....and a legend was born.

 

I love hot sauce and buffalo wings and am so excited to make my own. I usually use franks hot sauce and have researched a bit what types of peppers are used in theirs compared to a few others and have decided I am going to make a few different mixtures to see which one that I like.

 

Franks Buffalo Red Hot Sauce is comprised of:

-Distilled Vinegar

-Aged cayenne red peppers

-Salt

-Water

-Canola oil

-Paprika

-Xanthan Gum

-Butter

-Garlic salt

 

I looked into producing my own xanthan gum and am undecided if I will give it a try, I need to watch a few more videos and instructions as a lot of individuals seem to have failed. Xanthan gum is essentially a thickener seen in a lot of foods especially dressings. A fun fact, Xanthan gum is composed of bacterial corpses! Gross huh? The particular kind of bacteria is Xanthomonas campestris, a bacterium that infect plants. Many microbes surround themselves with an outer extracellular slime layer called a capsule composed of polysaccharide and occasionally a protein; X. campestris's capsule is composed of a polysaccharide. These capsules are useful to keep the microbe from drying, to glue it to a solid surface to prevent relocation, and can sometimes be linked to infection because it allows the microbe to cause disease.

 

To make Xanthan gum:

One grows X. campestris in a fermenter (an anaerobic process, however, contents in the tank are highly aerobic). Air is pumped into the tank and stirred  vigorously and the contents pour out slowly and thickly because the capsules are in such a large quantity. If you precipitate and kill the capsule and entrapped bacteria with an organic solvent (some videos show vodka- I need to research more) and dry the solid material, a light colored powder will present, xanthan gum.

 

The process of beginning the fermentation of the peppers begins with:

-Select the different types of peppers; possible tobasco, habanero, poblano, and jalapeno peppers.

-You will also need some garlic and salt for the initial process

-Wash all the vegetables

-Chop all vegetables

-Blend them all using a blender or other kitchen tool

-Add salt (approx. 2% of weight in salt- NO TABLE SALT) ill be using sea salt (the salt help prevent bad bacteria growth and assists in the speediness of the fermentation)

-Once blended, put contents into a glass jar of sorts (avoid plastic ware because the chemicals can leach during fermentation) glass is the safe bet

-Leave room for bubbling and fermentation

-Apply cheese cloth and rubber band so that it can breath but protects as well.

-Let sit x 2 weeks- 1 month

-Squeeze of the juices

-Add seasoning and thickener if desired

 

I am super excited to get started and hope that if this works out, franks hot sauce will have nothing on me! :-)