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Barrel Aged Hot Sauce

S

SimonDouglas87

Just to start off i'd like to say how awesome this forum is, i've gathered some really great information and im very impressed at how knowledgable and helpful everyone is! Hopefully in time to come I can do my bit and impart a little wisdom of my own!
 
The reason I have started this thread is to tell you a little bit about my first hot sauce, and hopefully gather a little advice on the way!
 
Ok, so the hot sauce has begun it's fermentation, I currently have Cayanne peppers and Scotch Bonnets working away in my hot room, they are batched into seperate jars so I can mix them later and get the flavour im looking for. I added brine made with pure sea salt and beautiful scottish water, which I distilled, and some whey gathered from unflavoured greek yoghurt to (hopefully) get things moving along.
 
We are only a couple of weeks in so on the fermentation front there's not much else to report. Its kind of bubbly and theres the occasional hissing noise coming from the seal of the jar which im assuming is ok?
 
The plan is to ferment for 90 days, although I do have scope to go longer as I have a couple of other non hot sauce related projects to keep me ticking along. (Thoughts?) Then id like to turn it into a smooth hot sauce (Advice here is very welcome, I have white vinegar is this ok? Ratios? to cook or not to cook? PH level required to make it 'shelf safe'?) which im going to barrel age in american oak barrels, which used to contain a multitude of caribbean rums for 6 months, or whenever I feel it has peaked.
 
I have a few photos to post but I'm either being a massive douche, not out of the question, or the forum/thread wont let me?
 
Id love to hear your thoughts, ill be keeping anyone who is interested up to date with whats going on and I have exact measurements for everything to hand if thats worth posting?
 
Kind Regards,
 
Simon
 
 
 
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I've got hot sauces that I've been working through for several years and have found that they always continue to develop.  I assume this is a function of oxidation, much like wine or whisky aging in a barrel.  Whisky will age and develop as long as its held in a barrel because of the slow oxidation that takes place through through the pores in the wood.  But once its bottled it will, if kept at a constant cool temp and in the dark, it will pretty much stay consistent until its opened.  Wine is similar, but will still continue to develop in the bottle, but at a much slower pace.
 
If it is oxidation that causes changes in hot sauce as it ages, there are things you can do to lesson the affects of time.  When you jar or bottle your sauce, leave as little air as possible, and don't allow new air in until you open it to use it.  Store it in a cool and dark place.  Once open, store it in the refrigerator if you think it'll take you more than a few months to finish the bottle.    
 
So I'd say age it until you think its perfect, then bottle it up really well and store it away until your ready to use it.
 
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Thanks turbo, it's out of the barrel now as I felt it had developed enough oak, I've got a load of woozys to bottle it up, I'm going to end up with about 2.5 litres I think. I added vinegar last night, although I'm not sure how much this will mellow out, I'll leave it a week, re taste and bottle if it's right
P.s. Do I have to bottle the sauce hot??
 
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< disclaimer: if you die because of listening to me its not my fault >
 
I personally don't do the whole "bottle the sauce while its hot, then reboil in the bottles, then let it cool upside down" thing.  But then again I'm also not serving it to people in a restaurant. 
 
If the Ph of your sauce is low enough to kill any little buggers, and your bottles are properly sterilized, and you boiled the sauce for 20'ish minutes, you should be ok if you plan on storing the bottles in a refrigerator.  If you plan on storing them on a shelf at room temp, you probably want to read up on canning and follow those procedures.
 
I've also found that hot sauce freezes really well, so I often will just boil the sauce for 20'ish minutes, let it cool then put it straight into freezer ziplock bags and freeze it.  Keeps forever that way you dont have to worry about germs and stuff.  Then you just thaw out a bag when you run out of sauce in your fridge.
 
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Ok, you can read the Hot Sauce 101 and salsa lady goes into proper bottling and explains it very well. Here are the essentials though to have a sauce that will be shelf stable, no refrigeration needed, up to about 6 months. I remember that you processed the sauce some prior to putting it into the cask so I'll take it from there.
 
1. Sterilize your bottles and place your caps into a sanitizing solution.
 
2. Put the sauce into a big enough pot, and add some water to it, 1/2 liter should be good and bring it up to a simmer for 30 to 45 minutes. This will help to tame the vinegar you added to it. 
 
3. Next you want to bring the sauce up to 195 to 200 dF (90.5 to 93.3 dC) for 15 to 20 minutes.
 
4. Fill 3 bottles and cap them. Now you want to invert them so the sauce touches the cap to sterilize them for at least 15 minutes. 
 
5. Then you can turn the right side up and allow to cool completely.
 
Lastly you can mail me the cask so I can take a turn with it :)
 
Cheers mate,
RM
 
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Ive got an absolutely savage almost black oil slick on top of the sauce, any suggestions as to how to deal with this? Im assuming its oil from the skin? Do I want to skim it off or try to mix it in?
 
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I've no idea, it's certainly oil and I can only assume it's come from the skins? The sauce tastes great until I actually put it on some food and it just seems to die out. It's too thin so doesn't coat food, rather it just runs off so I'm a little disappointed but not deterred! I have another batch on the go, this time I'm going to pickle the peppers first to soften the skins before going through everything.

My biggest issues for the first batch are separation of the sauce and a lack of flavour when applying to food, any tips on either of these would be useful!
 
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SimonDouglas87 said:
I've no idea, it's certainly oil and I can only assume it's come from the skins? The sauce tastes great until I actually put it on some food and it just seems to die out. It's too thin so doesn't coat food, rather it just runs off so I'm a little disappointed but not deterred! I have another batch on the go, this time I'm going to pickle the peppers first to soften the skins before going through everything.My biggest issues for the first batch are separation of the sauce and a lack of flavour when applying to food, any tips on either of these would be useful!
Click to expand...
I'm a newbie myself but I am following this closely as I have a barrel that I am wanting to use for the same thing. So, I would suggest by my limited knowledge that the use of a binding agent is in order ... xantham gum or one of the other multitudes found in the stickies. My question on the use of gums and barrels would be which comes first? Do you boil and add the gum prior to barreling or would you add the xantham gum after removing from said barrel? Also, cook sauce down before barreling, after, or both before and after? Sorry not trying to hijack the thread with my questions, hope it is ok to add them here! :)
 
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ComradeQ, my expert advice, given I have zero experience barrel aging anything nor any scientific background at all, is to boil the sauce before it ages in the barrel in order to kill off any living baddies since it'll be aging at room temp.  Also make sure your Ph level is low enough before you barrel it.  You don't want to kick an accidental fermentation inside the barrel (unless you actually want too). 
 
Then after the sauce comes out of the barrel, I'd boil it again to kill off any baddies that might have been cultivated in the barrel.
 
As far as xantham gum goes, I always do that as my last step before I bottle the sauce.  You could put it in the sauce before you fill the barrel, but I'd wait until after.
 
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Damn I lost this thread entirely somehow!! Update after a couple of years!!

I made the second batch which worked so well!! Did a double batch and ended up with around 5litres of sauce which (believe it or not) I have just finished the last of!!

I have lost all my notes and recipes so am starting from scratch again haha I should have done so 6 months ago but I've been busy with a million other things! How's everyone else doing? Any success stories or new info to share??


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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Wow...this thread is a blast from the past.  Funny this topic popped back up considering what I picked up this summer.
 
I've always wanted to play with barrel aging stuff, so on a whim at the state fair I picked up a 2 liter barrel (had to get the one with US Navy insignia) 
 
My plan is to use if for barrel aged cocktails for about a year, probably make about 5-6 batches of different cocktails.  Then next fall make a big batch of some sauce and age it in the barrel.  It might be interesting to give the barrel a good rinse, and then make another cocktail and see if it picks up notes from the hot sauce.
 
IMG_5813.jpg

 
My first batch was 2 liters of Manhattan
 
IMG_5848.jpg

 
After about 5 weeks in the barrel I think it's ready to put back in the bottle!
 
IMG_0106.jpg
 
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turbo said:
Wow...this thread is a blast from the past.  Funny this topic popped back up considering what I picked up this summer.
 
I've always wanted to play with barrel aging stuff, so on a whim at the state fair I picked up a 2 liter barrel (had to get the one with US Navy insignia) 
 
My plan is to use if for barrel aged cocktails for about a year, probably make about 5-6 batches of different cocktails.  Then next fall make a big batch of some sauce and age it in the barrel.  It might be interesting to give the barrel a good rinse, and then make another cocktail and see if it picks up notes from the hot sauce.
 
IMG_5813.jpg

 
My first batch was 2 liters of Manhattan
 
IMG_5848.jpg

 
After about 5 weeks in the barrel I think it's ready to put back in the bottle!
 
IMG_0106.jpg
Click to expand...
That is looking brilliant! I've just finished a year long ferment/age today! It's getting bottled as we speak I'm so excited!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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SimonDouglas87 said:
Just to start off i'd like to say how awesome this forum is, i've gathered some really great information and im very impressed at how knowledgable and helpful everyone is! Hopefully in time to come I can do my bit and impart a little wisdom of my own!   The reason I have started this thread is to tell you a little bit about my first hot sauce, and hopefully gather a little advice on the way!   Ok, so the hot sauce has begun it's fermentation, I currently have Cayanne peppers and Scotch Bonnets working away in my hot room, they are batched into seperate jars so I can mix them later and get the flavour im looking for. I added brine made with pure sea salt and beautiful scottish water, which I distilled, and some whey gathered from unflavoured greek yoghurt to (hopefully) get things moving along.   We are only a couple of weeks in so on the fermentation front there's not much else to report. Its kind of bubbly and theres the occasional hissing noise coming from the seal of the jar which im assuming is ok?   The plan is to ferment for 90 days, although I do have scope to go longer as I have a couple of other non hot sauce related projects to keep me ticking along. (Thoughts?) Then id like to turn it into a smooth hot sauce (Advice here is very welcome, I have white vinegar is this ok? Ratios? to cook or not to cook? PH level required to make it 'shelf safe'?) which im going to barrel age in american oak barrels, which used to contain a multitude of caribbean rums for 6 months, or whenever I feel it has peaked.   I have a few photos to post but I'm either being a massive douche, not out of the question, or the forum/thread wont let me?   Id love to hear your thoughts, ill be keeping anyone who is interested up to date with whats going on and I have exact measurements for everything to hand if thats worth posting?   Kind Regards,   Simon    
Click to expand...
 

I did a sauce once where I'd previously soaked some American toasted oak chunks in bourbon for about 3 months. I tossed them into the kettle when I was cooking the sauce at bottling time. There was a noticeable enhancement of flavor. Many vanilla notes but i suspect nothing compared to actual aging in a barrel.
 
Recently i made friends with someone who works at one of the nations largest distilleries. He's going to get me a used whiskey barrel for $75 (which is an absolute steal) and I am so pumped! But I will have to make a massive batch of sauce. Thats going to have to be the sauce of a lifetime though and require careful planning, and pepper sourcing.
 
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