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Chile wimp... should I even attempt a super hot sauce?

J

jhc

Ok not really a wimp, but I can tell I don't have the tolerance that most of this board does. My hot sauce enjoyment peaks at most commercial habanero sauces... good heat but I still get lots of flavor. I'd like to try some new flavors besides cayenne and habanero but would like the heat to stay around the level of, say, Melinda's original habanero sauce. Could I do that with ghost peppers or something similar with de-seeding and de-ribbing? Obviously I can dilute chiles with other ingredients, but that would dilute the flavor too.

Thanks to this forum I made a habanero and a chipotle-habanero sauce a few years back that was about as spicy as Franks. Can I make a ghost/reaper/etc sauce as spicy as Melinda's habanero? And which superhot has the most interesting flavor?

Thank you all in advance.
 
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You should introduce yourself in the Welcome portion of the forums as a courtesy. But Welcome to the forums and I find it tough to tame the heat, without compromising the peppers flavour, but that being said I find ingredients to compliment the flavor. Bell peppers onions fruits sometimes carrots experimentation is key to finding what will suit you.
 
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Spokanepepperman said:
You should introduce yourself in the Welcome portion of the forums as a courtesy. But Welcome to the forums and I find it tough to tame the heat, without compromising the peppers flavour, but that being said I find ingredients to compliment the flavor. Bell peppers onions fruits sometimes carrots experimentation is key to finding what will suit you.
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Thanks. I signed up years ago, didn't realize these were my first posts. Will introduce myself formally.
 
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Well, you can remove some of the heat by removing the placenta (the spongy-looking material that the seeds attach to) It is this, not the seeds themselves, that give a pepper a lot of its heat. The problem doing that with superhots is that they can have substantial oil deposits on the walls of the pod as well. So I seriously doubt that you will be able to cut, for example, a Moruga Scorpion down to anything like habanero heat levels by removing the seeds and placenta.
 
But there are many very tasty peppers that have about habanero level heat, and some good ones that are in between habanero and ghost level heat as well. Maybe one of those might be right up your alley. Yellow Scotch Bonnets are very flavorful peppers with habanero-class heat, and many caribbean-style sauces are based on them. If you want to kick it up a notch from there, then something like a Yellow 7 Pot or Yellow CARDI Scorpion would be a good step up from habs while still staying below superhot heat levels.
 
jhc said:
Forgot to mention I'd probably need to work with commercially available dried peppers, at least for now
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Why? Peppers are in season now. Why not buy some fresh pods from someone here and use those for your sauce? I believe randyp, AJ Drew, Texas Hot Peppers, and Sicman all have fresh pods for sale right now. There are also sauce recipes posted here if you want some different ideas to try. 
 
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I'm pretty sure Texas hot peppers is donating money from sales to hurricane victims right now, let me see if I can find the post

Its his status

"TexasHotPeppers
All Profits this week from Fresh Pepper Sales will be donated to Texas Hurricane Victims (Red Cross)"
 
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Just dive in and make something that will peel the paint off the walls.   After you have properly recovered the next day, you will have achieved a new level of pepper tolerance!
 
I agree with Black Fatalii, the yellow varieties of superhots can probably suit you well.  Yellow  Moruga or Yellow 7 Pots aren't in the millions of Scovilles.
 
I will also be courteous and go and introduce myself.
 
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The thing that makes a superhot different from jalapeños and habaneros is that every part of the pod has capsaicin. The trick is to try just the tiniest amount you can. When fresh ghost peppers showed up at the grocery store I cut off a very tiny slice and put it in my mouth, not knowing if I was about to run for the milk or if I had gotten it right. It was surprising how fruity it tasted. Then I chopped up the rest of the pepper and put it in my ramen (2 packets, 4 cups water). It wasn't enough, so next time was two pods. That was when I discovered something else about superhots. Adjusting the dosage by taste doesn't take into account the effects on the digestive system. Most of the impact comes after you have eaten it and it is too late to change your mind. Pepto abysmal is available in pill form and it can help. I also used to have pills with peppermint oil in an enteric coating; with the coating to ensure it opens after passing through the stomach it only takes a very small bit to cool the intestines. And then there is getting in the shower even hours after getting pepper juice on your hands. You get used to it. The more peppers you eat, the more heat you will need to get the same effect. After I fell off a bicycle and landed on my face, there were cuts on the inside of my mouth and I had to tone it down considerably. It was weird how I finally learned to appreciate other flavors in my sauces in addition to just having pure heat, but I lost a lot of my tolerance for the first couple months after my mouth healed.
 
 
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Not only cutting out the placenta and seeds but also rinsing and washing the inside with tepid water after helps remove some oils.
 
I recommend 7pot Burgundy, IMO its not quite a superhot but has excellent flavor.
 
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Make some sauce with Fataliis.  Oh, and just a thought: a lot of the commercial Habanero sauces i have tried are ¨diluted¨ with other ingredients, like onions and carrots.  I still put onions in all of my sauces, and carrots in some of them as well.  The goal is less about diluting the flavor, and more about finding ways to compliment the flavor while managing the heat of the mixture.  
 
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jhc said:
Can I make a ghost/reaper/etc sauce as spicy as Melinda's habanero?
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Sure, you could. Start out with a "base" of fillers, like a few red Bells, maybe a carrot, some onion, and a little garlic with some vinegar of your choice, and blend it all up. Add one (or half of a) Ghost/Reaper to the blender at a time until you get close to the heat level you're comfortable with. Bring it to a boil, let it cool, and taste it again. Repeat as necessary.

Let it sit in the fridge for a few days for the flavors to really meld together. It'll probably lose a little heat, but you can always go back and add more supers to it. A lot of it is trial and error, man. Have fun and TAKE NOTES! It sucks when you create something you really enjoy but didn't write it down and cant recreate it! :mope:
 
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