I posted about my garden ambitions a short while ago and this morning I got to wondering why it is that the garden is on my mind at this time of year. Then it hit me: sauerkraut and hot sauce. I made a couple of hot dogs the other day and placed store bought (Vlasic) sauerkraut over the dog and splashed on just a few (a judicious few) drops of some hot sauce I had made a couple of years ago. That stuff is both hot and has a great flavor and I’m down to my last bottle. Oh, by the way: to say that I made it a few years ago is only kinda/sorta correct as it is still slowly continuing to ferment.
It’s made from fermented ‘Super Chili Peppers’ shown above. These weigh in on the top of the medium range of Scoville Heat Units (SHU) at 50,000 SHU. They are also know as ‘Asian Super Chili Peppers’. They are a dead ringer for the ‘Thai Chili Pepper’ (shown below). Thai Chili Peppers have a SHU rating of 100,000.
If you had bushes from both varieties in your garden then you’d not be able to distinguish between them on looks alone. Here is how to tell the difference: pick a couple of peppers from the plant, then reach down and grab your genitalia. If you quit screaming within a week then it was a Super Pepper, any longer then it was Thai.
I found a site that shows 470 pepper varieties and their respective Scoville Heat Units (SHU). It is located here. The table is by SHU (vice alphabetical) so the search/find feature of in your browser is your friend.
Ferment the peppers by coarsely chopping and then toss them in a jar with salted water. Things will get wild for a while and then calm down after a couple of weeks (I let mine go long). Everything, including the brine, goes into the blender until it is completely liquid. Poor it into bottles (Amazon is your friend) and you’ve got a great hot sauce that is, as far as my tastes go, on the upper limit of heat.
The sauerkraut made me think about the garden as well. Once you make your own, at home, with cabbage from the garden (notice I didn’t say your garden), store bought just doesn’t quite scratch the itch. Beyond remembering the great taste of past ferments, I ran across this as I was looking through old links.
Ingredients: cabbage, red apple, caraway seeds, whey, salt and spring water. Can’t wait to see if I can make this ferment work!
So even though I can’t get out of my driveway I’m thinking of a garden and what kind of great stuff can be created from 5th year soil (vice the dirt Ive been growing in for the last 4 years).