Homemade Brine-Fermented Pepper Sauce

[lperry]

I am intrigued by this article on making a fermented hot sauce, similar to Tabasco.  I also happen to have three ají­ Lí­mo plants that are on the verge of falling over because they are so covered in fruit.  I'll put the jar together tonight.  Is anyone else in?

[lperry]

Peppers are mostly seeded (de-seeded?) chopped, and in the jar with sea salt and a cheap Riesling.  Ready to ferment.

[thistle]

I did an old school hot pepper vinegar, by pouring warmed apple cider vinegar over whole, ripe Thai chile peppers. How long do you think you'll let yours ferment before you start tasting it?

[lperry]

^ I'm not sure.  RIght now it smells kind of weird with the fruitiness of the peppers and the wine combining into something that's a bit overwhelming to my sense of smell.  I may go the old-fashioned way and just keep adding peppers in as they get ripe outside.  I first heard about this being done in a commercial kitchen (poor memory - maybe Commander's?) by the chef who added leftover peppers to a fermentation jar that lived on a shelf, and that was the house sauce.  I'm hoping it turns out well. 

[lperry]

Another round of peppers got ripe, so I chopped them up and tossed them into the jar with another pinch of salt and cup of wine.  I was feeling lazy so didn't seed this batch.

 

[lperry]

11 days in, and more peppers added this morning with a bit of sea salt.  I can't say I've seen any enormous amount of bubbling that websites discuss, but there has been a fine sheet of minute bubbles on the top of the brine from time to time, and it smells nice now.   No issues with molding, but that could be the alcohol content.

There's probably about another kilo of peppers outside, but they are green, and I don't think I can eat and/or give away a kilo's worth of sauce anyway, so I will probably fill the jar, let the last of the peppers ferment for a couple of weeks, and finish it off.

[Ilaine]

Looks interesting, but what we have too many of are Habaneros and something I don't remember that is long and skinny.  Both turning bright red.

I don't actually use hot sauce myself, my husband is the chile head, he will eat habanero peppers whole and raw.

Thinking of suggesting this to him.

[lperry]

I put the last batch of chopped peppers into the brine about two weeks ago, so I decided to finish the sauce off over the weekend.  Lo and behold, it was bubbling away like they said it would, and it was still going strong this morning.  I don't know why it took so long to ferment properly, unless the cool air in the house kept the bugs from taking hold really well.  At any rate, it smells very pleasant and fruity and has no sign of molding, so I'll let it finish it's bubbling before I put it through the food mill.  We'll see how many more days that is. 

[lperry]

The fermentation finished, and I put the resulting mash through a food mill.  Here's the fermented peppers before they got milled.  They lost a lot of their fun neon color.

This is the finished sauce in bottles, and another cup or so went in the freezer.  I spilled some on the cutting board, tasted it, and got salt right before so much fire that I couldn't make out the flavor.  The aroma is still fruity, although decidedly fermented.  I also have brand new linings in my sinuses.  It's nothing like making a cooked sauce inside (which I will never do again - best done on the grill side burner), but there are definitely fumes.  I'll try it on rice next time I cook some to try to get the full flavor profile.

[Ilaine]

You have inspired me to make my own, or, more accurately, coach my husband into making his own.  Yesterday I did some googling, and, while the recipe you used was toward the top of the search results, I was more interested in the ones that have a result close to Tabasco.  Pick, wash, destem peppers.  Weigh.  Add 2% non-iodized salt by weight.  Grind.  Pour into a sterile canning jar.  Cover the top with cheesecloth,  Ferment.

Eventually, you do something else, but that is as far as I got.  I vaguely remember visiting the Tabasco plant and going on the grand tour of the operation on Avery Island years ago, but I became ill (not related) and we cut it short.

I was hoping we could try half the batch with just salt and half the batch with some liquid from lacto-fermented sauerkraut as a starter, as well as the salt, but many of the peppers had gone bad on the bush so not all that much volume.

[Ilaine]

Progress report. Peppers ground down yielded about 12 ounces. I am still in a wheelchair, so husband did it. He used the Cuisinart and they are chunkier than I would have done.

I watched a Discovery channel video on the Tabasco plant first. They use 10% salt by weight. We used 8%. After a few days, no visible fermentation, so he poured in enough liquid from an old jar of Bubbies lacto fermented pickles to cover the peppers. Three days later, still not much going on, so he's pouring in more sauerkraut juice from a newer jar of red cabbage and beet sauerkraut. At least it's not rotting.

Maybe too much salt, maybe kitchen too cold. House is about 67 degrees at night, 64 during the day. Considering grinding it all to a slurry in the Vitamix. Bought some jar tops with air locks, but not sure whether to use one.

[lperry]

Mine took a long time to ferment, so it may be perfectly fine, just doing it's thing slowly.