Habanero Pepper Sauce

[piscal3]

Cooking the chiles would reduce the distinctive flavor of the habaneros in this hot sauce, so add them raw. The high percentage of both acetic and citric acids keeps the sauce from spoiling..


12 habanero chiles, stems removed, chopped
1/2 cup chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tbsp. vegetable oil
1/2 cup chopped carrots
1/2 cup distilled vinegar
1/4 cup lime juice

Saute the onion and garlic in the oil until soft. Add the carrots with a small amount of water. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer until the carrots are soft. Place the mixture and the chiles in a blender, and puree the mixture until smooth. Combine the puree with the vinegar and lime juice and simmer for 20 minutes to combine the flavors. Strain the mixture into sterilized bottles and seal.

 

[Justaguy]

Nice basic sauce. I personally would simmer for 15-20 minutes after the blender, but that is just me. Looks tasty and a great building block to add to.

 

[RocketMan]

+1 to Justaguy, you need to simmer that sauce longer to get it to about 195 degrees F and then bottle it and if the temp drops below 185 just heat it back up. By heating the sauce to that temp you kill any nasties and steralize bottle, reducers and caps when bottling.

Oh and dont forget to invert the bottles for 15 minutes or so to take care of the reducers and caps.

sauce sounds good

 

[Justaguy]

invert the filled bottles for 15 minutes

 

[The Hot Pepper]

Cooking the chiles would reduce the distinctive flavor of the habaneros in this hot sauce, so add them raw. The high percentage of both acetic and citric acids keeps the sauce from spoiling..

You need to read up on botulism and clostridium botulinum with raw fruit/veg. Cooking kills it. It also thrives in oil (you have oil in your recipe) if uncooked.

All hot sauces and canned salsas are cooked, because they have to be. Unless you buy from the refrigerated section.

You should ditch your bottles and read up on food safety/home canning.

 

[salsalady]

Piscal, you're close on your process. I hope you don't take offense at the technique suggestions, they are for your (and your family and friends's) safety.

Your ingredients are probably fine. Can't know for sure without a pH test, but there's a good bit of vinegar:other ingredients ratio.

Cook it, blender it, add the chiles and cook some more, then strain it (or use a food mill) BUT! after straining it, bring it back up to high temp and bottle as described above. Straining the sauce or running it through a food mill will drop the temp to where it won't sterilize the inside of the cap. The bottles may be sterilized, but there's still the reducer, if you used one, and the inside of the cap that need to be sterilized by the heat of the sauce.

After straining, you don't have to cook it for an extended period of time, just get it back up to temp.


Now, having said all that, if you intend to keep it in the refer, then the bottling temp isn't as critical, but it should be cooked thoroughly. In case you haven't seen it, there's some good info here-


And whatever you do, Have Fun!

SL

 

[The Hot Pepper]

What SL says is true and the pH is very important for low acid foods, because the acid level is too low to kill the bacteria. Hot sauce is a low-acid food, so the pH must be correct. Also you have oil in your recipe, and botulinum will thrive in this, you know, oil and water/vinegar whatever don't mix so... if your sauce is not properly processed it will live in the oil!

Botulinum spores are very hard to destroy at boiling-water temperatures; the higher the canner temperature, the more easily they are destroyed. Therefore, all low-acid foods should be sterilized at temperatures of 240° to 250°F, attainable with pressure canners operated at 10 to 15 PSIG. PSIG means pounds per square inch of pressure as measured by gauge. The more familiar "PSI" designation is used hereafter in this publication (the Complete Guide to Home Canning). At temperatures of 240° to 250°F, the time needed to destroy bacteria in low-acid canned food ranges from 20 to 100 minutes.


More reading:
http://nchfp.uga.edu...nned_foods.html