Hot Sauce

I like the flavor of Louisiana, but it doesn't bring enough hot.

Can't get Crystal around here.

 

Crystal's my favorite, and fortunately widely available on the Left Coast. Tabasco just tastes like heat--Crystal has favor to it as well as heat.

 

I did a story on a guy who ran a hot sauce store some 10 years ago. He gave me a bottle of his best, award-winning stuff: "Acid Rain."

Most good hot sauces, I've come to realize, put Tabasco to shame. One drop is all you'd ever need of this stuff, and though it goes down hot doesn't stay that way for more than a minute.

I haven't owned a traditional Louisiana or Tabasco sauce since I wrote that article.

 

Tapatio for Mexican food, Texas Pete for hotdogs, burgers, etc.

 

another one for Texas Pete, milder and sweeter than Tabasco, excellent on any fried foods, especially pork tenderloin

 

Figures that Texas Pete goes well on pork. It's from North Carolina, not Texas. Poseurs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_sauce

Mentioned in the link: Pickapeppa, a very nice sweet/hot sauce from Jamaica that's vaguely similar to a steak sauce, but more versatile...more sweet/hot, less tang and vinegar. Pour some over a block of cream cheese and add some crackers and you have a damn fine appetizer/game-watching snack.

Turns out Sriracha is Thai, not Vietnamese...

 

My personal favorite is garlic tabasco, but I can't get that unless I order it online from the fine folks in Louisiana.

 

Damn, didn't realize I was that uncultured.

Tabasco is in about every store and restaurant. I've seen Louisiana, Franks, and Crystal in stores. Do you have to go to places such as Whole Foods, Wild Oats or to special restaurants to get the others?

 

Pickapeppa is sometimes put with the steak sauces; usually with the cayenne sauces...but it's widely available at normal supermarkets. For Mexican sauces, your friendly neighborhood Mexican grocery store won't rob you like Whole Foods/Wild Oats will.

 

McIlhenny's Tabasco

mmmmmmm

Great with cheap beer and popcorn.

 

Not purely a hot sauce -- but Dinosaur BBQ (Syracuse and other locations) makes a Habernero BBQ sauce called Wango Tango that is out of this world. Makes incredible wings, especially if you can get ahold of some big meaty roaster wings and smoke them first.

Texas Pete is great with BBQ or to add flavor and heat to lame chili. Crystal is also very good.

Personally, I like Tabasco in small doses to kick up stuff like a white sauce or cheese sauce, or in the mayo for chicken salad. Used very sparingly in those applications it adds subtle flavor without really adding unwanted heat.