The Great Hot Sauce

Hot sauce is pretty much the greatest condiment ever created. It instantly adds a great and powerful flavor to event the blandest meal, and if you’re into your food fighting back the right hot sauce can literally knock you on the floor. No wonder you can use it for all three meals.

 

The entire world uses hot sauce. While the ingredients vary from culture to culture, most involve a basic chili pepper combined with other local flavors and vinegar. Some places go for flavor, like Mexico. Others tend to go for pure spiciness, like England (which, considering their generally bland food, makes perfect sense). Even in America, the preference varies from region to region. Louisiana hot sauce is a potent, red chili peppered flavored concoction like Tabasco. Hawaiian Chili Pepper Water is usually used for cooking instead of a condiment. And then you have the absolutely amazing Sriracha sauce, an Americanized version of Thai hot sauce.

 

But the crazy thing about hot sauce is how tame most of them are. The spiciness of anything is measured on the Scoville scale. A jalapeño pepper has a basic rating of about 5,000 Scoville units. While that might seem like a lot, the scale goes up to 16,000,000 so a jalapeño is nothing by comparison. The 16 million is the rating of pure Capsaicin—the primary chemical ingredient that causes the the burning sensation on  yoru tongue. Pure capsaicin can be added to food for an intense heat if you’re truly daring. But if you’re insanely daring you can go even hotter than Capsaicin. Resiniferatoxin can be fatal if too much is ingested but it has a Scoville rating of 16 BILLION so if you want your mouth to literally burn off, talk to your local chemist.

 

So what happens if you’re dared into taking a shot of capsaicin and need to cool down your mouth? Well, for starters, stay away from water. Milk is a much better solution to take the burn away, as is yogurt or complex carbs like rice. Also moving the mouth will lessen the effect. Next time you get a few too many mouthfuls of chicken wings, chew on some milky rice for a while and you’ll be back to stuffing spicy things back in your mouth in no time.

 

No matter if you like to spike your raw oysters, add a bit of bang to your eggs or whip up some wing sauce – Hot Sauce is a man’s wingman in the kitchen. With hundred of brands out there to pick from – we wanted to make it easier for you. Here are a few brands to check out:

 

Mild:

 

Texas Pete Hot Sauce: This mild man favorite is great with chicken wings. Is your wife’s chili not hot enough? Kick it up a notch it with this bottle.

 

Iguana Red Cayenne Pepper Sauce: This tomato base bad boy also contains onion, garlic flavors with a touch of molasses and other spices.

 

Ed’s Red: Also known as  “An Oyster’s Best Friend” this bottle from Port St. Joe, Florida was made to accompany an oyster. It has a touch of horseradish and lemon juice that makes you keep shucking.

 

 

Medium:

 

Cholula Hot Sauce: This blend of peppers and spices enhances food flavors without overpowering them – we put it on our eggs.

 

Hula Girl Red Jalapeno Hot Sauce: If you like a little heat – but don’t want it to overpower your mouth this is your baby – with red jalapeno peppers, vinegar, salt, garlic and spices.

 

 

Hot:

 

Marie Sharp’s No Wimps: If you are a hot pepper lover- then this is your companion. You might need a cup of milk to tame your fire burning mouth.

 

Clancy’s Fancy Hot Sauce: Are you an Asian lover, but want more kick to your soy sauce? Add this hot sauce blended with honey and ginger to any dish for that intense flavor you are missing.

 

There are thousands of varieties and brands of hot sauce commercially available. What are your favorites? It is time to SPIKE your food….