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Fiery Hot Pepper Sauce in three jars surrounded by peppers on a cutting board
Sauces & Condiments

Simple Fiery Caribbean Peppersauce (hot sauce)

Yes you would have seen me make this in the past, but with the abundance of peppers from my garden and the fact that older recipes tends to get archived in Google search.. why not rock it again and share? Peppersauce (yea one word) or Hot Sauce is one of those condiments we make and enjoy across the Caribbean and anywhere we call home. Everyone will have their own signature way of making theirs, but this is the sort of base version you can later tailor to your own liking.

You’ll Need..

30-35 hot peppers (as described in the video)
2 head garlic (12-16 cloves)
6 limes (juice)
1 teaspoon salt
10 leaves shado beni (culantro)
3/4 cup white vinegar

Important! Wear GLOVES and wash your hands immediately after with soap and water. If doing this recipe gluten free, go through the full list of ingredients to make sure they all meet with your specific Gluten Free dietary requirements. Finally, I used a variety of scorching hot peppers from my garden.. use peppers you have access to and those you enjoy.

Wash and dry the peppers. Remove the stems and give them a rough chop so it’s easier work for your blender or food processor.

Peel and smash the garlic and give the shado beni (or cilantro) a rough chop. If you can’t get CULANTRO (shado beni), feel free to use CILANTRO (about 1/2 cup). Juice the limes.

Basically, everything goes into the blender and puree until you have a consistency you like.

This is a raw peppersauce as the vinegar and acidity of the lime juice will be enough to cure it. Store in sterilized glass containers in a cool dark spot. Or for a longer shelf life, store in the fridge.

I did use the seeds from the pepper in the sauce for maximum heat and rather than use a food processor, I opted for a blender as I wanted something more smooth. But if chunky is what you like, so be it. Feel free to add a bit more vinegar should you want to thin it out a bit more

Click on the Recipe Index for more pepper-sauces, some of which can be bit more complex in flavors.

Sauces & Condiments

A quick pepper sauce when you need a little “zing”.

habanero hot sauce recipeFor those of you who’ve been following my updates on FierceSauces.com will know that I have a growing collection of  hot sauces (peppa sauce as we say in Trinidad and Tobago) and I use this affair I have with spicy sauces to write short reviews. Though I purchase new ones every time I come across varieties I don’t already have, I can honestly say that nothing beats a “fresh” made sauce.

Here’s a simple recipe for a very quick hot sauce that packs a wicked punch. It’s sure to add some zing to whatever meal or snack you introduce it to. For me it was a case of having some jerk pork tenderloin I just took off the grill and I craved a fresh peppa sauce to top the thinly sliced pieces of pork to enjoy while I watched play-off football this weekend.

*This makes about 1 1/2 cups of hot sauce.

You’ll Need…

1 teaspoon salt
4-6 cloves garlic
20 habanero or scotch bonnet peppers (use any hot pepper you like and can tolerate)
3/4 cup vinegar
1 cup roughly chopped cilantro
4 mild peppers (banana, Cubanelle, Hungarian Yellow, Biscayne Sweet.. etc)

Before we get to the actual process, I must mention that the peppers I used were all frozen. Every spring I plant an assortment of hot peppers, including my favourite…  the habanero. When I reap them in the fall, I place them in freezer-lock bags and keep them secure in the freezer. I then have enough peppers to last me until next harvest. So if you ever have an abundance of peppers, do remember that you can freeze them. During the winter months the very same peppers sell for between $7 and $11 a pound in the local super markets so I can’t afford them. Luckily I have my supply in our freezer.

Wash and remove the stems from the peppers and chop roughly (wear gloves if you’re using scotch bonnet or habanero). Then do the same with the garlic and cilantro so it’s easy to work with in the food processor.

Add everything to a blender or food processor and process for a couple minutes. Try to get a smooth consistency but try not to overwork it, since we don’t want to add too much air  and risk it getting foamy.

Taste for salt (if you’re getting a sort of raw taste with no flavour except the heat of the pepper, add a little more salt)

*Fresh squeezed lime or lemons also add another lovely level of flavour to this sauce.

Place in a jar and use as needed. Normally since we used vinegar as the liquid in the sauce, you should not have to refrigerate it. However it may be a good idea to place it in fridge just as  a precaution. Please note though that the sauce will loose a bit of it’s heat the longer it stays in the fridge.

trinidad hot suace recipe

jamaican hot suace recipe

trini peppersauce

quick home made hot suace recipe

Do you have a quick hot sauce recipe you’d like to share? leave me a comment in the comment box below.

Happy cooking!

Chris…

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Sauces & Condiments

Shado Beni hot sauce which will rock your socks off!

trini-hot-sauceOn our last vacation to Trinidad and Tobago for carnival 2009, my sister had made reservations at the Hyatt Regency for our group to have breakfast. After all the amazing food we’ve been enjoying thus far on our trip, this day was going to be my BEST culinary experience on the island yet. Eddie my sister’s friend from Switzerland had spoiled us the past 4 days with amazing home-made dinners. Some of the best sauces I’ve ever had the pleasure of experiencing. Plus the street food we devoured every night after partying, were divine.

Back to the breakfast at the Hyatt… BTW if you’re ever  in Port Of Spain, be sure to have breakfast here. Not only is the food and service tops, nothing beats dining steps away from the ocean. While on my prowl at the buffet I noticed a green sauce sitting all lonely in a corner of the “meat” section. Long story short.. it turned out to be a “shado beni” hot sauce that the chef made fresh on a daily basis. Yea, I even got our waiter to sneak me some to take home in a little disposable cappuccino cup. It was that good. That little green sauce that was so full of flavor and punch, added a new momentousness to plain scrambled eggs and sausage.

Here’s my version of this amazing Shado Beni hot sauce.

You’ll need….

1 bunch of shado beni (subsitute 1 bunch of cilantro)

1 lime

1 hot pepper (or as many as you can handle)

1/4 teaspoon of salt

1/4 cup of water.

3 cloves of garlic

Don’t be fooled by how simple this recipe is… it’s GUARANTEED to excite your taste buds.

hot-sauce-recipe

Remove the skin from the garlic, slice and place in food processor. Cut and squeeze the lime juice in the processor, then add the salt, water and hot pepper. Now wash and rough cut the shado beni (or cilantro) and … place in food processor.

caribbean-hot-sauce

trinidad-hot-sauce

Final step is to puree the entire lot for about 3-4 minutes, stopping to push the ingredients down so everything gets worked.

shado-beni-hot-sauce

That’s it, you’re done! Be sure to check for salt and heat level. If it’s not hot enough for you, simply add more peppers as necessary. STORAGE – Use fresh or place in a container in the refrigerator.

how-to-store-fresh-hot-sauce

USE? Anywhere you usually use hot sauce on. Grilled meats, chicken wings, as a side on dishes, on your eggs in the morning (yum).. be creative!

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