[CH] sauce time! (Mindy, this is for Keith)

raincrone@juno.com
Sat, 28 Aug 2004 02:28:04 -0400 

I just bought the makings for this year's batch of hot sauce: Winn-Dixie 
is having a pepper sale.  All the hot ones are $1.69 a pound, and the 
habaneros are big, fresh and fragrant,  so I cleaned out the bin.  The
jalapeņos  are the wimpy "almost heatless"  kind, but the serranos are 
good, so I'm using those this year instead; I love their flavor anyway.  


My recipe is super-simple; too much so, I'm sure, for many  of you on
the Chile-Heads' List, but maybe it'll get somebody making sauce who
hasn't had the nerve before.  At least, I hope  so; homemade sauce is
SO much better than most storebought.  Anyway, here it is:

1 1/2 to 2 lb.  good habaneros
1 1/2 lb           good HOT jalapeņos (or serranos)
Enough           pickling-strength vinegar brine -- to each quart
                                of water, add 1 c. vinegar and 1/4 c.
salt     
                              
Remove caps  and split the peppers.  Seed them if you want, but 
don't remove the membranes.   I like the habs ripe and the jals
or serranos green, but suit yourself.

Cook, covered, in enough of the brine to get 'em done without 
burning, but not enough to cover them.   First, though, open the 
windows, turn on the exhaust fan and put a towel under the door 
if you live in a building with a shared hallway; no sense being 
responsible for somebody's asthma attack, and besides, all the 
chileheads in the building will show up wanting samples. :-)

When the peppers are fully tender but not mushy, and have cooled to 
where they won't melt the rubber gasket of a blender, blenderize
the living tar out of them in batches, along with the liquid.  This 
really does take a blender at top speed, not a food processor.

Put the sauce in clean jars, leaving an inch of headspace.   Then, twice,

freeze them solid overnight, take them out  and let them thaw fully.  
This breaks the remaining intact cell walls so the sauce doesn't
separate.

The next step is crucial to the flavor, though it scares some people
(unjustly, I assure you):

Remove caps and let jars sit, covered with a loose-woven tea-towel 
or two or three layers of cheesecloth, for two to three weeks in a 
warm room or on a screened porch.  This allows the good 
microorganisms, the ones that improve flavor, to get going; 
rest assured, no other kind will survive the combo of chiles 
(they're germicidal), vinegar and salt.  Many Koreans leave vats 
of chile paste in the backyard all year long.  If you made sauce 
last year and it's still good, putting a dab in each jar can help 
start the process quickly.  If a white bloom appears on top, just 
stir it in; it's the friendly stuff.

Then bottle, label and store.  Will keep unrefrigerated for several
months unrefrigerated, or for a year in the fridge.

Keep on rockin',
Rain
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