So I guess I’m a mere piker with my li’l bottle of McIlhenny tabasco?
Wait, just remembered - we also have a bottle of “Sweet Saskatchewan Heat” (lime & jalapeno sauce), custom made for the Saskatchewan Roughriders.
That still doesn’t elevate me into the hot saucenoscenti, I’m thinking.
We always have some Sriracha sauce on hand. Sriracha is a district in Chonburi province here in Thailand, the same province that contains Pattaya. The sauce is great, although I haven’t really picked up on the garlic aspect. Especially good with sai ua, which is a type of northern-Thai sausage.
When we lived in Hawaii, the wife became impressed with tabasco sauce, but we never keep any at home.
Oh, and some of the hot sauces in New Mexico I introduced the wife to she loved.
My “go to” hot sauces are, in no particular order:
Tapatio
Huy Fong Sriracha
Crystal
Pico Pica
Franks Red Hot
Tabasco
Which one I use is largely dependent on what I am putting it on.
Our main hot sauce is Salamander Sauce, something we made from our peppers last year. Basically we took a couple pounds of cayennes, processed them with garlic and a little sugar, layered them in a jar with salt, and let them ferment for about a week. At the end of the week, once they were all good and bubbly, we filled the jar with white vinegar. Two months later we pureed the mess, getting a sauce similar to Sriracha but much more garlicky (and a little bit funkier, in a good way). We’re almost done with the jar, but then, our pepper plants are going to start fruiting in about a month, too.
I just tried Chipotle Tabasco last night. I love to eat fries with Tabasco-laced ketchup, and last night the restaurant didn’t have regular Tabasco, so I used Chipotle instead. It was goddam delicious.
Daniel
I am a Louisiana boy so I try to stay true to Tabasco. That is one incredible marketing company. You find it in gas stations across the U.S. even when they have a tiny food isle in a 24 hour store in New Hampshire or Vermont. My mother has the full collection of Tabasco art prints and they are both large and attractive. I like their whole collection.
I really like Cholula too however.
I have started to completely disrespect super-hot sauces however. I have a bottle of Mad Dog Inferno hot sauce in the refrigerator that comes in at about 100,000 Scoville units. I have eaten it a few times as a stunt but it icauses rather severe pain for a while. They sell it at the local Stop-N-Shop but they really shouldn’t because it can hurt someone and even a few drops can ruin an entire bowl of chili for most people. I do not approve of that type of thing.