This year I really wanted to grow peppers so I could make my own hot sauce. I planted some Santa Fe Grande, Serrano, and Habanero peppers. The Serranos have gone crazy and have many peppers on them, the Santa Fe Grandes are doing well, and I am still waiting on some Habaneros to ripen. I have so many of the Santa Fe Grande and Serrano peppers that I decided to make a hot sauce using the two pepper types combined.
The Santa Fe Grandes are mild and rate about 500-700 on the Scoville Unit scale. That means they are less than half as spicy as a jalapeno.
The Serrano are much spicier and rate 5000-23000 on the Scoville scale. I think mine are a bit on the mild side.
The recipe I followed came from the Make the Bread Buy the Butter book. The recipe called for Fresno peppers, but I figure any peppers will work well for hot sauce and each kind will give it’s own unique taste and heat. Instead of fresh garlic, I used pickled garlic from Petrou Foods. They sell at a local farmers market. The pickled garlic is a bit sweet and is good enough to eat plain. I also added dried cilantro for flavor.
I ran the peppers and other ingredients through the blender until they reached the right consistency. I then poured the sauce into jars and put it into a cabinet to sit for 6 weeks.
I think it is going to be hard to wait 6 weeks for the hot sauce to be ready…
-Joshua