Re: [CH] consumer opinion
Jonathan T. Smillie (jsmillie@protix.com)
Wed, 20 May 1998 11:36:56 -0500
Following up on what's being said about hot sauce (and in deference to Judy's request for more info), here's just some more things I think about in terms of my favorite condiment:
I do tend to use hot sauce almost exclusively as a condiment- on the side of the plate, on a sandwich, etc. In general, if I am looking to heat up a recipe, I will use fresh, dried or ground chiles in preference to hot sauce. Of course, there are applications, such as wing sauce, where you might need both hot sauce AND ground chiles... Any comments? Anybody out there use hot sauce principally as an ingredient?
Different hot sauces, of course, have different textures, and I think the texture of a sauce is as important as its taste when it comes to deciding how to use it. For example, I tend to use "chunkier" sauces- those with whole bits of vegetable and/or chile in them, such as Walkers' Wood Scotch Bonnet- on sandwiches or as dipping sauces, whereas for topping pizza, I'll use a smoother sauce such as Sriracha or Cholula. As Rael (think it was he) mentioned some time ago, there is nothing that beats El Yucateco Green on eggs (even if the Green is artificially induced...)
Overall, where texture is concerned, I think there's a real spectrum. I tend to classify sauces into one of four textural categories:
Liquid: sauces with a very high fluid content and no solids, such as Franks, Texas Pete, and the much-reviled Tabasco.
Smooth: basically, fluid but thicker than the liquid sauces, and without detectable pieces of whole ingredients. Examples: El Yucateco, Scorned Woman.
Chunky: sauces with a significant amount of recognizable vegetable matter. Examples: Walkers' Wood, Matouk's Calypso, Busha Brown's Pukka Sauce. Probably the category from which I buy most of my sauces.
Paste: Very thick sauces, with or without detectable vegetable matter. Most of the extract-based sauces I've run into (Endorphin Rush, Dave's Insanity) would fall into this category, as would Tuoung Ot Sriracha.
Anyone have other ideas/thoughts on this?
Jonathan
Overall, it really does come down to personal taste. I happen to think that Tabasco tastes like a bottle of vinegar that got too friendly with the Cayenne shaker, but that's why I don't have it in the house.
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<bold>Conservative</bold>, <italic>n.</italic> A statesman who is
enamored of existing
evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to
replace them with others.
- Ambrose Bierce, <italic>The Devil's Dictionary</italic>