When my dad came over from Texas to visit us a few months ago, one of the things we requested that they bring was Louisiana Hot Sauce. We can buy Tabasco here, which we use a lot in cooking, but the flavor of Louisiana Hot Sauce is so much nicer on tacos, eggs and other things we want to spice up a bit. They brought one of the biggest bottles of Louisiana Hot Sauce we’ve ever seen (among other regular-sized bottles) and one bottle of jalapeno hot sauce. Neither of us had ever tried jalapeno hot sauce but I have to say it has a delightful flavor.
We’ve been harvesting jalapenos from our plants in the greenhouse for a couple weeks now and finally found a recipe that appealed to us which answered our question of what to do with all those fiery little peppers. We’ve got Burpee Jalapeno M and Jalapeno Gigante strains growing and had about a pound of chilies to work with. It was almost a shame to cut all those little guys up for sauce, but it tastes absolutely fantastic. And we’re fairly sure it’s hotter than the store-bought version.
When you’re cutting up chilies of any kind, be sure to wear rubber gloves. The heat from the peppers will burn your skin, especially from the hotter varieties, and NEVER touch your face while working with them. Some people even harvest their peppers while wearing gloves. You might also want to wear eye protection when you’re sauteing the onions, garlic and jalapenos to avoid getting any juice splashed into your eyes.
The following recipe made about 6 cups of hot sauce. We processed the finished sauce in 1 cup (250ml) jars for 15 minutes afterwards so we don’t have to keep it all in the fridge. I’m not sure that even we would use it up fast enough. Unfortunately we lost two jars when they opened up in the canner. That will teach me not to buy the cheapest little jars available for canning! Those suckers are going to find their way onto eBay very shortly.
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- 2 teaspoons vegetable oil
- 50 fresh jalapeno peppers sliced
- 6 cloves garlic minced
- 1 cup minced onion
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 4 cups water
- 2 cups distilled white vinegar
Ingredients
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- In a medium glass or enamel lined sauce pan over high heat, combine oil, peppers, garlic, onion and salt; saute for 4 minutes. Add the water and cook for 20 minutes, stirring often. Remove from heat and allow mixture to cool to room temperature.
- Transfer the mixture to a food processor and puree until smooth. With the processor running, slowly add the vinegar.
- Pour into a sterilized jar with a tight lid. This sauce will keep for 6 months when stored in the refrigerato
