For a food category you love, what's just right vs. over-the-top artisanal machismo?

[pulykamell]

@Chronos

The really crazy thing with hot sauces… I can show a sort of respect to the ones that are just trying to get as hot as possible. At least there’s a clear goal there. But most hot sauces seem to actually be competing on how hot they can make the name of their product. Take “Pure Cap”, for instance. Not only is it not actually pure capsaicin, the last I checked, it’s actually milder than jalapeno. And then there are the ones that proudly proclaim that they’re made from habaneros or Indian ghost peppers or whatever, but they’re only at something like 1% concentration. Why not just use a milder pepper to begin with, if that’s what you were aiming for?

Well, yes, there is a good bit of marketing and branding going on there at the XTREME!!! end. A lot of those sauces seems to be purely capitalizing on machismo. And, well, if there’s a market for it, and they can somehow separate themselves from the hundred other companies doing the same thing, good for them. Me? As I said above, beyond Dave’s Insanity, I had a difficult time distinguishing between all these very similar products.

Now, the ghost pepper thing is definitely a bit faddish, as are Trinidad scorpions and so forth. I could see using them in relatively small concentrations, though. The habanero-type peppers (capsicum chinense) have a very distinct flavor to them. You don’t really need a 100% habanero hot sauce to taste it. A little bit and it’s obvious, and it’s not just the heat. If I make a spice blend for, say, chili, I base it mostly on anchos and guajillos, both middle-of-the-road chiles with a lot of flavor that won’t kill anyone, but I may add a tiny bit of habanero for a little bit of sting and that distinct habanero flavor they have. But not too much, because I don’t like a very obvious flavor of habanero in chili. I like it in other foods, but not that one. Just like I don’t like stir fries made with habaneros, but I may use a nearly as hot pepper like Thai birds chiles. The flavors work better for me. Also, it seems some chiles have a “tip of the tongue” burn to them, and others have a “back of the throat” burn to them and balancing that could be important.

As for ghost chilis, of the habanero-type peppers, they’re not really that flavorful, in my opinion. The only reason I personally would put a ghost chili or Trinidad scorpion in a spice blend is to say, hey guys, that chili or sauce has ghost chiles/Trinidads in it. World’s hottest peppers! That said, there may be some people out there who appreciate their flavors, so I could be wrong.

As I’m musing aloud, this year I grew a good numbers of different habanero-type peppers, including ghosts, Trinidads, mustard habs, scotch bonnets, and fataliis. My clear favorite this year was the fatalii. I think it will become my c. chinense pepper of choice. Scotch bonnets and mustard habaneros rated very highly, too. The ghost and Trinidads were my least favorite of the bunch. Almost chemically in flavor. The thing is, once you get to a certain Scoville rating (say 100,000+, maybe 300,000+), it’s pretty darned difficult to tell what pepper is hotter than another–like comparing the heat from a 900F pan and a 1000F frying pan by touch-- and flavor is all you can really go on. At least in my personal experience.

[pulykamell]

I guess what kind of irritates me or confuses me is how and why in the hell all these little companies are springing up and making, essentially, variations on the same product. Or even the home-made hot sauce types. Like when you go to a farmer’s market or there’s some person who decides to have a hot sauce business on the side, they all tend to do the same thing. The world doesn’t really need another run-of-the-mill habanero sauce, no matter how lovingly created. Last time I was at a particular bar for a crawfish boil, there was a woman selling her homemade, fire-roasted habanero sauce. And you know what? It was a solid product. But it was one of a gazillion other habanero sauces out there.

Why not distinguish yourself from the market by offering up a line of hot sauces based on slightly lesser known, but equally delicious, peppers? Like the aforementioned fatalii? Or how about the Peruvian aji amarillo? Very distinct and flavorful. It will require a bit more educating the public about these peppers, but if the taste gets hold, you don’t have too much competition.

Or it could be that the type of eater I am – one who likes to explore a bit – is not necessarily how most people approach food, and they want more of a known quantity. That said, “chileheads” tend to be an experimental bunch, so it would seem to be a great risk to take. I mean, look how the slightly odd-ball chipotle smoked peppers have just absolutely over-saturated the market. But, at one point, hot sauces flavored or based on chipotles were a difficult find. Why not take advantage of the early market, when competition is low, and demand is escalating?

[Hershele_Ostropoler]

Sourdough flatbread with bufala mozzarella, sliced San Marzano tomatoes, and hand-shaved Asiago actually does sound good, but usually I just want a fucking pizza.

[Nava]

Huevos fritos con puntilla (“a fried egg with a bit of brown”) are egg perfection.

Any meal that’s ever been deconstructed should be taken out back and dumped.

Any cook who’s ever deconstructed a meal should be taken out back and shot.

Any cook who’s deconstructed a fried egg should be taken out back, shot in the gonads and kept alive.

[aruvqan]

@pulykamell

I guess what kind of irritates me or confuses me is how and why in the hell all these little companies are springing up and making, essentially, variations on the same product. Or even the home-made hot sauce types. Like when you go to a farmer’s market or there’s some person who decides to have a hot sauce business on the side, they all tend to do the same thing. The world doesn’t really need another run-of-the-mill habanero sauce, no matter how lovingly created. Last time I was at a particular bar for a crawfish boil, there was a woman selling her homemade, fire-roasted habanero sauce. And you know what? It was a solid product. But it was one of a gazillion other habanero sauces out there.

Why not distinguish yourself from the market by offering up a line of hot sauces based on slightly lesser known, but equally delicious, peppers? Like the aforementioned fatalii? Or how about the Peruvian aji amarillo? Very distinct and flavorful. It will require a bit more educating the public about these peppers, but if the taste gets hold, you don’t have too much competition.

Or it could be that the type of eater I am – one who likes to explore a bit – is not necessarily how most people approach food, and they want more of a known quantity. That said, “chileheads” tend to be an experimental bunch, so it would seem to be a great risk to take. I mean, look how the slightly odd-ball chipotle smoked peppers have just absolutely over-saturated the market. But, at one point, hot sauces flavored or based on chipotles were a difficult find. Why not take advantage of the early market, when competition is low, and demand is escalating?

Sounds like a good idea to me, I have always thought that the ‘eat it for the burn’ pepper sauces were stupid, I prefer flavor to heat a thing which many of my friends do not understand. I like a balanced flavor profile, I rarely do a single flavor brick to the face style of cooking though I do like the original buffalo wings [back in the day when I lived in Rochester the rest of the kitchen monkeys and I would head to the Anchor after closing our kitchen for some late drinking and snacking. Rochester bars closed at 2 am, Buffalo stayed open til 4 and we typically got off work at about midnight, so the 1 hour banzai run for wings was an event we did about every other week. Though The Riverboat and Maxwells Silver Hammer both did good wings. I personally have probably made several hundred pounds of wings after work in the kitchen for coworkers and can probably do it in my sleep.]

[pulykamell]

@aruvqan

I prefer flavor to heat a thing which many of my friends do not understand. I like a balanced flavor profile, I rarely do a single flavor brick to the face style of cooking though I do like the original buffalo wings

But, like I said above, you have to be careful about that. There’s a lot of things I eat that I feel have a lot of flavor and balance, but others only taste “hot” in. Like don’t get near my jerk wings if you don’t like habanero-level heat.

Interesting thing about the Buffalo wings. Despite being someone who loves his heat in his food, I’ve never been fond of the ultra-hot styles of wings, for some reason. At least not ones that I’ve gotten at the bar or restaurant. (And the Anchor’s suicide wings are just weird with all that black pepper. Taste good for about one or two wings, but then it’s just overwhelming.) Medium is really the way to go for me, with suicide on the side if I feel like dipping. Otherwise, the way a lot of places make them, they use more Frank’s (or whatnot) and less margarine or butter, so the suicide sauces I often find overly acidic.