Delicious and Spicy Homemade Hot Sauce Recipe

I do call this recipe ‘hot sauce’, but I am not talking about the packets of orange liquid they serve along with your order at Taco Bell.  This sauce is chunky and bursting with fresh pepper flavor and acidity, and can be as mild or as insanely hot as you or the crowd you are serving can handle.

October is a wonderful month for peppers of all kinds.  The fruit has had plenty of time to grow and ripen without damage from frost.   The peppers that you choose for this recipe are really up to you.  If you cringe at the idea of spicy food, this same recipe can be made with all sweet bell peppers and will make a deliciously tangy sauce with barely any spice.  If you really love the burn, you may choose to include one or two habaneros or scotch bonnets.  If you are not sure about a pepper’s heat, check out the Scoville scale to get an idea of how much heat a certain kind of  pepper has.  Either way you want to use peppers that are as fresh as can be so that your sauce has good flavor.

The best part of this recipe is that it is easy as can be, especially if you own a food processor or blender, and it has great Mediterranean flavors that make a wonderful accompaniment to fish or meat, and an awesome condiment for burgers or omelets.  I particularly love using it on fish tacos.

Ingredients:

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.  Place all of your fresh peppers on the baking sheet.  Cut off the very top of your head of garlic.  Pour about 1/2 teaspoon of the olive oil over the exposed to of the garlic and place it on the baking sheet as well.  Place the peppers and garlic in the oven for 40 minutes or until they are soft and turning brown.  Remove the peppers and place them in a bowl.  Cover the bowl with plastic wrap so the peppers steam, which will make it much easier to remove their skin.

Once the peppers have steamed for about ten minutes, you should be able to peel the skin easily.  I do this with a pairing knife.  Remove the seeds (unless you want your sauce extra hot – the seeds contain most of the heat of a pepper) and stems.  Squeeze out the roasted cloves of garlic.  Put the peppers and garlic in the food processor with the basil, parsley, olive oil, vinegar, lemon juice, and salt.  Pulse the ingredients until the are will  combined but still chunky, as I think this is what makes this sauce taste so fresh and delicious.  Taste the sauce cautiously, and if it is hotter than you would like, add lemon juice and salt to tone down the heat a bit.  Serve as a condiment for anything you would normally use hot sauce for.   You may want to let guests apply their own!