Recently @Ger asked about using celery in a hot sauce recipe. I wondered what would happen if you used potato and apparently potato has been used in some sauces before. So I decided to experiment on Saturday.
I started with my standard recipe. I filled my blender jar with as many Bahamian Goats as I had (about half full) then added one yellow onion (cut into chunks), a bulb of fresh garlic, 2tsp salt and 1tbd sugar. I then peeled two medium potatoes and cut them into chunks and blended it all up. I added apple cider vinegar until I was getting a nice smooth blend with no visible chunks or bits. Sadly I had run out of my usual ACV so I had to use the walmart stuff.
Then into the pot to cook. Before it got up to temperature, I checked the pH and it was 5.3. While I stirred and held the pH meter, my wife added more ACV until we got to a pH of 4. It took a lot more vinegar than normal and after looking at the charts, I'm not surprised. Potatoes have a natural pH in the 5.6-6 range whereas capsicum is 4.6-5.4. Remember that pH is a logarithmic scale so 4.6 is ten times more acidic than 5.6.
Anyway, I cooked away and it started foaming a little and then settled into a simmer.
I usually leave my sauces on the lowest heat for 45mins to 1hr to cook thoroughly. By the end, it had gotten thicker - not simmering but burping like lava. I ran it through a fine mesh strainer then went straight into bottles. It poured fine through the funnels and filled the bottles with no problems. Given the thickness, I didn't add any inserts, I just capped and inverted. I did taste it and it's sharp!
So this morning I decided to try it out. I restored the bottles to their normal orientation and saw that the little air that was there struggled to move up the bottle. Uncapping one and it pours but just barely.
It tastes pretty good - I don't get any potato and the distinctive Bahamian Goat taste is there. But it's way more acidic than my usual sauce and far thicker - it only just makes it out the bottle. And the mouth feel is different - it has very slight grittiness that you feel with mashed potato before you add all the cream and butter. I like it - it's something different from the usual recipes.
I always make vinegar based sauces but this seemed to have more bite. Not that this bite isn't nice - I actually quite like it - but I wanted to recheck the pH so I busted out the meter and tested. pH 3.7! I didn't believe it, so I recalibrated the meter and tried again; 3.7. I don't know what's going on here. I tested pH 4.0 in the pan and acetic acid usually boils off faster than water so if anything I expect the pH to go up a little. Perhaps the potato is holding on to the acid somehow?
In any case, a fun experiment. I will definitely be adding potato to my sauces in the future to thicken them up. It doesn't change the taste much but I do need to solve the pH issue. Next batch, I will get to about pH4.5 in the pan and see what happens post bottling. I also need to get some more Korean apple cider vinegar (it's the best tasting large bottle vinegar I've found) and try again on the weekend.
I started with my standard recipe. I filled my blender jar with as many Bahamian Goats as I had (about half full) then added one yellow onion (cut into chunks), a bulb of fresh garlic, 2tsp salt and 1tbd sugar. I then peeled two medium potatoes and cut them into chunks and blended it all up. I added apple cider vinegar until I was getting a nice smooth blend with no visible chunks or bits. Sadly I had run out of my usual ACV so I had to use the walmart stuff.
Then into the pot to cook. Before it got up to temperature, I checked the pH and it was 5.3. While I stirred and held the pH meter, my wife added more ACV until we got to a pH of 4. It took a lot more vinegar than normal and after looking at the charts, I'm not surprised. Potatoes have a natural pH in the 5.6-6 range whereas capsicum is 4.6-5.4. Remember that pH is a logarithmic scale so 4.6 is ten times more acidic than 5.6.
Anyway, I cooked away and it started foaming a little and then settled into a simmer.
I usually leave my sauces on the lowest heat for 45mins to 1hr to cook thoroughly. By the end, it had gotten thicker - not simmering but burping like lava. I ran it through a fine mesh strainer then went straight into bottles. It poured fine through the funnels and filled the bottles with no problems. Given the thickness, I didn't add any inserts, I just capped and inverted. I did taste it and it's sharp!
So this morning I decided to try it out. I restored the bottles to their normal orientation and saw that the little air that was there struggled to move up the bottle. Uncapping one and it pours but just barely.
It tastes pretty good - I don't get any potato and the distinctive Bahamian Goat taste is there. But it's way more acidic than my usual sauce and far thicker - it only just makes it out the bottle. And the mouth feel is different - it has very slight grittiness that you feel with mashed potato before you add all the cream and butter. I like it - it's something different from the usual recipes.
I always make vinegar based sauces but this seemed to have more bite. Not that this bite isn't nice - I actually quite like it - but I wanted to recheck the pH so I busted out the meter and tested. pH 3.7! I didn't believe it, so I recalibrated the meter and tried again; 3.7. I don't know what's going on here. I tested pH 4.0 in the pan and acetic acid usually boils off faster than water so if anything I expect the pH to go up a little. Perhaps the potato is holding on to the acid somehow?
In any case, a fun experiment. I will definitely be adding potato to my sauces in the future to thicken them up. It doesn't change the taste much but I do need to solve the pH issue. Next batch, I will get to about pH4.5 in the pan and see what happens post bottling. I also need to get some more Korean apple cider vinegar (it's the best tasting large bottle vinegar I've found) and try again on the weekend.
