Posting more to be informative and get comments on simmering and other's results with simmering of a sauce.
Yesterday started the milling of 6KG of chilies that have been in a salt ferment for 30 days.
Basic recipe proportions and ingredients are: (using a previous batch as an example)
THAI CHILI 3390 GMS BEFORE SMOKING, 2720 after
9 HEADS OF GARLIC 298 GMS BEFORE, 272 GMS AFTER
24 SHALLOTS 136 GMS BEFORE, 130 GMS AFTER
TOTAL WEIGHT AFTER 3120 GMS
SALT 106 GMS
4 CUPS WATER
I went straight from the fermenting bottles to the food mill. As I will illustrate later, I found this was a mistake and it would not maintain the sauce consistency I've always gotten straining through a screen.
After milling, I noticed that the sauce was watery, i.e. tabasco consistency. I figured OK lets do a simmer of the sauce and that will thicken it up. I had bad results previously boiling thai chili sauce with oily looking globules at the top of my bottles once bottled. That discussion is here.
I also wanted to simmer to insure the cessation of fermentation on top of the addition of vinegar.
To the 4 liters of watery sauce, I added 1 liter of pineapple vinegar. Then I began the simmering. I took temperature readings and never went above 160°F. As the sauce was simmering, it began to separate AGAIN! I simmered the sauce (stainless steel Calphalon pot) for less than an hour as watching the dark red substance separating from the sauce just really pissed me off. I did my best to skim a lot of the red floating material. This is the same effed up mess I got after boiling the sauce previously....except it was watery.
At this point I have a watery freakin sauce and crap floating all over looking like %$#%$. I then realized I had skipped a step that I usually do which is to take the fermented mash and then run it through the blender for one minute to REALLY make it fine. I would then mill it thru a screen like so.
This is new sauce on the left, old preferred thick sauce style on the right
Here is the separated sauce in the pot. Nasty looking.
Close up of the separation. Fugly mess!
So with my watery funky looking sauce, I decide, since I still have most of the chili chaff that had been milled out by the food mill, I would throw that back into the NOW vinegared sauce and put it all through the blender. Something I should have done before putting it all through the food mill. <face palm>
Now that it has been re-blended and run through the food mill again with the smaller holed screen this time, the sauce is now thick a la sriracha sauce and how I want it to be. I will not simmer this again as it is now completely (thankfully) homogenous even after sitting for an hour. I really don't have good luck with heat and this recipe/chili!!!
With a pH of 2.8 this sauce should be fine in sterilized bottles.
The reason I didn't use the blender coming from the fermenting bottles as I usually do is that I was excited, in a way, to be using the food mill for the first time. So I jumped the gun as it were and jumped right to the milling step and a watery sauce is what I ended up with!
Yesterday started the milling of 6KG of chilies that have been in a salt ferment for 30 days.
Basic recipe proportions and ingredients are: (using a previous batch as an example)
THAI CHILI 3390 GMS BEFORE SMOKING, 2720 after
9 HEADS OF GARLIC 298 GMS BEFORE, 272 GMS AFTER
24 SHALLOTS 136 GMS BEFORE, 130 GMS AFTER
TOTAL WEIGHT AFTER 3120 GMS
SALT 106 GMS
4 CUPS WATER
I went straight from the fermenting bottles to the food mill. As I will illustrate later, I found this was a mistake and it would not maintain the sauce consistency I've always gotten straining through a screen.
After milling, I noticed that the sauce was watery, i.e. tabasco consistency. I figured OK lets do a simmer of the sauce and that will thicken it up. I had bad results previously boiling thai chili sauce with oily looking globules at the top of my bottles once bottled. That discussion is here.
I also wanted to simmer to insure the cessation of fermentation on top of the addition of vinegar.
To the 4 liters of watery sauce, I added 1 liter of pineapple vinegar. Then I began the simmering. I took temperature readings and never went above 160°F. As the sauce was simmering, it began to separate AGAIN! I simmered the sauce (stainless steel Calphalon pot) for less than an hour as watching the dark red substance separating from the sauce just really pissed me off. I did my best to skim a lot of the red floating material. This is the same effed up mess I got after boiling the sauce previously....except it was watery.
At this point I have a watery freakin sauce and crap floating all over looking like %$#%$. I then realized I had skipped a step that I usually do which is to take the fermented mash and then run it through the blender for one minute to REALLY make it fine. I would then mill it thru a screen like so.
This is new sauce on the left, old preferred thick sauce style on the right
Here is the separated sauce in the pot. Nasty looking.
Close up of the separation. Fugly mess!
So with my watery funky looking sauce, I decide, since I still have most of the chili chaff that had been milled out by the food mill, I would throw that back into the NOW vinegared sauce and put it all through the blender. Something I should have done before putting it all through the food mill. <face palm>
Now that it has been re-blended and run through the food mill again with the smaller holed screen this time, the sauce is now thick a la sriracha sauce and how I want it to be. I will not simmer this again as it is now completely (thankfully) homogenous even after sitting for an hour. I really don't have good luck with heat and this recipe/chili!!!
With a pH of 2.8 this sauce should be fine in sterilized bottles.
The reason I didn't use the blender coming from the fermenting bottles as I usually do is that I was excited, in a way, to be using the food mill for the first time. So I jumped the gun as it were and jumped right to the milling step and a watery sauce is what I ended up with!