Hot Sauce!

I love it when the garden and the kitchen collide. And this is the season when there is one collision after another. I've made pickles, salsa, tomato juice, peach butter and so on. Now I have three hot pepper plants loaded with peppers. So what's a girl to do? I was planning on pickling them (and I still may do that) but after watching Rick Bayless's "Mexico One Plate At A Time" I decided to make some hot sauce. I followed the recipe exactly as listed on his Frontera Kitchen website and have included it here. I guess the only difference is that I used a different hot pepper entitled "Little Boy" pepper (I've come to realize the joke intended by my darling husband's grandfather).

Habanero Hot Sauce

Makes about 2 cups

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Ingredients

5 cloves garlic, unpeeled
½ cup peeled, roughly chopped carrot (you’ll need 1 medium carrot)
½ cup roughly chopped white onion (you’ll need about half of a small onion)
12 medium (about 5 ounces) orange habanero chiles, stemmed
1 cup apple cider vinegar
About 2 teaspoons salt
¼ teaspoon sugar

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Directions

Roast the garlic in a skillet over medium heat, turning regularly until soft and blackened in spots, 10 to 15 minutes. Cool and peel. In a small saucepan, combine the carrot, onion and habanero chiles with the vinegar and 1 cup water. Partially cover and simmer over medium-low heat until the carrots are thoroughly tender, about 10 minutes. Pour into a blender jar, add the roasted garlic, salt and sugar. Blend until smooth. Thin with a little additional water if you think your hot sauce is too thick. Taste and season with additional salt if you think necessary. Pour into jars or bottles and store in the refrigerator until you’re ready to add some dazzle to a dish.

Here is the lovely results and it is quite tasty. If you like that super hot punch-in-the-mouth type of flavor (which I do!).



As you can see, I did not purchase this bottle especially for this little project. I've been saving olive oil bottles, soy sauce bottles... you know the little bottles with the plastic regulator on top for items just as this. It is recycling at it's best in my book!