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Chiles at Rushy Springs Farm
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One of the most iconically-American (and especially Southern) condiments is salt-brine-fermented hot pepper sauce. Usually made from tobascos (the pepper variety, not the brand), this kitchen staple and table condiment is a snap to make, especially if you have a glut of chiles on hand. Here in East Tennessee, chile season is still in full swing, and many varieties thrive here. Despite, or rather because of this easy abundance (chiles were our most dependable crop this summer and last, outperforming our tomatoes by leaps and bounds), many chile growers do not know how to keep on top of utilizing their crop before it disappears.

Pickling, drying, and smoking are all very good options for preserving your garden's chile harvest, but each has special (and often prohibitive) requirements: shelf space, a dehydrating apparatus, and a smoker, respectively. Salt-brine-fermenting needs none of these, requiring only a tiny bit of counter space for a fermenting crock or jar, some salt, a stir every now and then, and some patience. As for the chiles, tabascos are great, but there are so many varieties out there. As long as they are yellow, orange, or red, ripe, and appropriately spicy for your palate, use whatever you have or can get your hands on.

Luckily, in addition to our harvest of red jalapeños and yellow aji limos, we have had the good fortune to become acquainted with Jim Smith, a local chile farmer and producer of fermented hot sauces. Jim inspired us to try our hand at this simple and rewarding process after many chats under his tent at the Market Square Farmer's Market in downtown Konxville. At any time, Jim has up to 14 different varieties of chiles for sale, ranging from the mild and unusual to the punishingly hot (Ghost and Scorpion chiles are his best sellers). He also offers a completely unique hybrid cultivar, the Tennessee Cherry Chile (a much more complexly-flavored cousin to the Yucatania and Tabasco varieties). In addition to having all of these available fresh from his farm every week, Jim keeps even busier with his growing salt-brine-fermented hot sauce business. If that wasn't enough, he also dehydrates a portion of his harvest, turning it into highly aromatic chile powder (including one made out of Boldog Paprika peppers).

Jim was kind enough to let us tour his operation in Talbott and give us some insight into how he ferments his sauces. One of the immediately unique standouts to his procedure: after stemming the chiles, they get brined in a mixture of unrefined salt and Reisling wine. The wine, of course, increases the amount of sugar available for fermentation. As for the unrefined salt, Jim claims fermentation is much more vigorous and complete when he uses it (which, he thinks, is due to the high mineral content). As for fermentation time, Jim has a very personal relationship with each batch. He tends them daily (sometimes hourly in their most active stages). If peppers rise to the surface, they get mashed back down. If any yeast starts to develop, he adds salt. As the chiles soften and disintegrate, he adds more chiles and more salt, continuing the fermentation until he feels it is complete. This can take four to six weeks, but each batch is different.

Since Jim and his delicious sauces and chiles have inspired this blog (as well as many a fine meal), we want to return his kindness and generosity by calling upon you, our readers, to help support Jim as he continues to sustainably grow chiles and turn a profit while complying with Tennessee's requirements regarding domestic food production. Acording to state inspectors, Jim needs to have a certified kitchen and meet many of the same requirements much larger, corporate-owned food producers are held to. In order to continue selling his sauce, Jim will have to spend money he does not have to abide by these regulations. All of this despite the fact that his sauces, by their very nature (highly acidic, capsaicin-rich) are antimicrobial and safe, and Jim himself oversees the entire process, from planting the chiles to bottling the sauce. The overhead required to convert a home kitchen into an approved domestic kitchen is prohibitive for small producers like Jim.

The beauty of Jim's Kickstarter campaign is that, if we all contribute a small amount, he can meet his goal in no time. For those of you unfamiliar with Kickstarter, it's an site where entrepreneurs can raise money with the help of their community, and contributors to the project receive a gift in proportion to the amount they pledge to the project. Think of it as venture capital 2.0. The entrepreneur picks the goal he wants to reach, and if he doesn't meet that goal, he gets none of the money pledged. If, however, he does meet the goal, the money that has been pledged becomes available for use by the entrepreneur for their project.

If you are in the Knoxville area, we emplore you to visit Jim's Kickstarter page, read about his plans to expand his business, and contribute to the campaign (even a dollar makes a difference!) and visit him at Market Square on a coming Saturday. For those of you who do not hail from East Tennessee, we hope you can identify with the plight of Jim's business, his dedication to quality, and his tireless search for the perfect capsacin rush. Please take a moment to make a difference in the life of a small farmer, and therefore, in his community.

Other articles you might enjoy: Brine-Fermented Sauerkraut, Fermented Half-Sour Pickles, Worcestershire Sauce

Fermented "Louisiana-style" Hot Sauce
varies according to amount of chiles

As our pepper fermentation expert says above, a lot of this is best done "by feel," and since the quantity of peppers a garden yields will vary widely (not to mention the width of fermentation vessels) we have decided to write this recipe using a simple weight ratio and a few instructive photos. As for the type of chiles to use, any kind will work as long as they are fairly hot and not green.

So, first you should cut off the stem and a little bit of the base of each chile and roughly chop them. We do this with gloves and a pair of kitchen shears, since it means minimal contact with the peppers and no surfaces to clean. Some of you might want to seed the chilies to get more flavor and less heat from them. Jim includes seeds in his method, we did not for our first go around. Either way is fine, just keep in mind seeding will expose you to more capsacin, which you should try as hard as you can not to get on your hands, eyes, or anywhere on your skin.

So snip off the stem-ends in the trash or compost, seed if you want, and then weigh the chilies in a bowl on a digital scale (I suppose you can just use the starting weight of the chiles if you do not choose to seed them). Remember this number and snip the chilies a slice at a time into your jar or crock. Now, take the weight of your chilies and weigh out 2% of that amount in salt, preferably sea salt (thanks Jim!). Add this to the jar/crock, along with enough white wine (prefereably a high-sugar Reisling or Gewürstraminer that is free of sulfites) to cover by a half inch or so. Mix and mash thoroughly with a pestle or wooden spoon (be sure to wash thoroughly).

Cover the crock or jar tightly with a cloth (I screwed on the ring of the mason jar I was using) and set out on the counter where you will see it. Now, when you're making coffee in the morning, check for white mold (this is where glass jars are clearly superior) and remove with a spoon, stir the chile mixture, and cover again with cloth. Do this every other day. You will eventually see bubbles forming either on the surface or in the pepper mash. This means it's working.

Jim and others ferment this mixture for as long as it takes for the fermentation to stop, up to 4 or 6 weeks. Our very successful batch of hot sauce took only 15 days to mature into a fruity, well-balanced sauce. I suppose you should play it be ear, but for those who are too impatient for the longer fermenting times, if you have noticed fermentation bubbles, you can and should take a risk somewhere around or after the two-week mark.

Now that the pepper mash is fermented to your liking, patience-level, or whim, all you need to do is run it through a food mill. Place the food mill over a bowl, pour the pepper mash and brine into the mill, and work the flesh and seeds, rotating the handle in both directions to push as much juice from the mash as possible (discard whatever is left). Measure the volume of the brine liquid and add half that amount of vinegar. Jim uses brown rice vinegar for its neutral flavor profile, but feel free to experiment here with a little addition of something more flavorful, like sherry or apple cider vinegar. You shouldn't really need to add salt at this point, but do so if it tastes a little one-dimensional. Bottle and refrigerate, adding to anything that needs a nice fruity shot of heat or salt. Enjoy!

Comments

Jess's picture

Submitted by Jess
FYI - i have asked a few local wine stores and there is really no such thing as a riesling or other sweet wine free of sulfates. even the organic stuff. My brew is going well with the sulfite filled (but kinda fancy) wine I bought.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Thanks, Jess! We've used wine containing sulfites in the past with no issues, but it is logical to think that something added to wine to stop fermentation would also impact a ferment made with that wine. I guess the lactic acid bacteria are just too robust for the sulfites. Thanks for the feedback!
Colin Nagle's picture

Submitted by Colin Nagle
I tried a small batch with green chilies and after about 2-3 weeks wasn't noticing any fermentation taking place. So I then drained it, rinsed it all and carefully followed the recipe again and basically restarted using the same peppers. Using only peppers, wine, and literally a pinch of salt. Is this ok or is this batch no good?
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hmm...I don't think a pinch of salt would be enough--the salt needs to be at least 2% of the weight of the peppers. Of course, the peppers probably absorbed some salt from the first 2-3 weeks. I'm also concerned that you may have washed away much of the flavor of the peppers when you washed away the brine. I know that fermenting green peppers is quite possible, but we have never done it. Our pepper guru Jim advised against using green chiles because they don't have the natural sugars that red chiles have. Try this--taste the brine. If it's pretty salty, don't add any more salt, but if it doesn't taste very salty, add more salt. Then add some whey from the top of a container of yogurt. You'll need some lactic acid bacteria, and the yogurt will provide that. Normally, the LAB would be on the outside of the peppers, but it was probably washed away with the brine. Good luck! I hope this batch works for you!
Karen Powell's picture

Submitted by Karen Powell
I make a traditional Louisiana-style hot sauce from a family recipe, which was handed down verbally because original was lost in Hurricane Katrina. I am in my third year of growing, processing and bottling for sale commercially and like Jim, found that I have to meet a lot of criteria for the FDA. Thankfully a licensed thermal-processing kitchen has now opened in my city, so I can legally process and bottle for sale. I have never added salt at the first stage of processing, mainly because my uncle who created this recipe, told me to add it after it fermented. I do add yeast, regular cake yeast. Each year I haven't had a problem with fermentation, but I just checked the batch and all containers have white and green mold on the top. I have not found anywhere mention of green mold, which worries me. Because the sauce is made in such large quantity (approx. 15-30 gallons depending upon harvest), and it must be housed for fermenting at the commercial kitchen, I cannot check it daily let alone twice daily. I have two more weeks until I'm scheduled to bottle. It has been fermenting two weeks up til now. I have no idea if I should skim the mold off the top, try adding salt now, or what I should do. Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hi Karen! Green mold isn't dangerous, but I would skim it off the top. It's black mold that you really don't want. As for the salt, the reason we add it at the beginning is to prevent bacteria other than lactic acid bacteria from colonizing the ferment. Lactic acid bacteria is salt-tolerant. However, you can ferment without adding salt initially. What you really want to look for is pH. If you don't have a pH meter, get one right away. You can find affordable ones online. Your ferment needs to have a pH of 4.6 or lower to be safe--if you are adding vinegar to your hot sauce, factor that in because the vinegar will also help lower the pH. But having a pH meter will let you know that your pepper sauce is getting more acidic over time, which is what should happen when you ferment things. Does this help?
Paul's picture

Submitted by Paul
My mash has been setting for 11days in a crock and no sign bubbles . The wine is evaporating, should I add more wine? Move to a warmer spot? I have a plate ove r the mash to keep it under the liquid like you would do for kraut.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hi Paul. Try adding some whey from plain yogurt with live cultures. That will probably help start the fermentation. Is your crock covered with anything? I would put a plate over the mash to keep it submerged. Add more wine if absolutely necessary, but covering it should help with evaporation.
paul's picture

Submitted by paul
Thanks Meg, I have the plate in place from the beginning and have it covered tightly with a folded dish towel. I'll try the whey.
Karen Powell's picture

Submitted by Karen Powell
Thank you Meg! I process and bottle (and hold for fermenting) at a commercial kitchen, so they have a pH meter and I definitely test it before bottling. I haven't yet tested, but yes, I also do add vinegar. Unfortunately, there was black mold too. 3 separate containers; one had white, green and a bit of black mold; 1 had white and green and 1 had none. Really odd, I don't know why the difference since all made the same, same way, ingredients, same location for fermenting, etc. I scraped off the top layer with my hand because it had dried out enough, to remove all the mold, then stirred each batch. I plan on stirring again often, but should I add salt now, would that black mold even if just on top, cause a major problem now even when removed? Thanks so much!
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
I think the bottom line is the pH. If the pH is decreasing (getting more acidic), and there's no rotten garbage smell or sliminess, you're probably just fine. Generally, if something is wrong, it will be pretty obvious. If the mold has grown down inside the pepper mash, that's bad. But if there are no signs of spoilage, I think you're good.
Mike's picture

Submitted by Mike
Is it possible to have added to much wine?
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
I suppose it's possible. You don't want the chiles to be swimming in the wine--just barely submerged.
Brian Challender's picture

Submitted by Brian Challender
I've read through many of the comments linked to this blog, however, I can't for the life of me find the conversation about how to thinken up the sauce if it's runnier than you'd like it to be. Does anyone know how to thicken up a runny sauce or even turn it into more a chicken wing sauce?
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hi Brian--we use xanthan gum to thicken it. Use 1/8 teaspoon xanthan per cup of sauce. The sauce should be warm when you add the xanthan. I recommend blending the sauce, bringing it to a simmer, then putting it back in the blender and adding the xanthan very slowly with the blender running. Just a warning--if you add too much xanthan, it can make the sauce slimy, so start with a little and add more as needed.
Brian C.'s picture

Submitted by Brian C.
Thank you...I have about 12 cups of hot suace sitting in my fridge to stop the fermentation process but it looks a little clear at the top and normal color of sauce at the bottom, probably because I think I added too much wine, will the xanthan bring them together? I really wanted this to turn out to give as gifts this holiday but I don't know if it is salvagable, any other tricks are appreciated. Doesn't taste great either...it doesn't taste bad but I dont know what to put in it to make it taste more like a tabasco or even like a buffalo type hot sauce
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Separation is normal, so I wouldn't worry about that--the xanthan gum will thicken the sauce slightly and prevent it from separating. If you think there's way too much wine, you can pour some of the clear-ish liquid off the top. As for the flavor, have you added any vinegar yet? You definitely need to add vinegar to get a more Tabasco-like flavor. You can also add other things--you might decide it needs more salt or maybe some garlic or even onion. One trick that a lot of Mexican hot sauce producers use is to add shredded carrot to the sauce--it helps thicken, and once it's all blended up you'll never even know it's there. What I would do is pour off a little of the clear liquid on top, then puree the sauce in a blender. Put it in a pot and bring it to a simmer. Add garlic, onion, carrots (carrots really finely shredded; onion grated on a box grater; garlic mashed to a paste) and anything else to taste (salt, vinegar). Simmer until the carrots are tender and puree the whole thing again. Strain again. Then, once you're happy with the flavor, add the xanthan gum (add this really slowly with the hot sauce in the blender, blender on--once you add too much xanthan, the mixture gets slimy). Again, you want about 1/8 teaspoon xanthan gum per cup of liquid. The liquid should be hot or warm and moving as you add the xanthan. I hope this helps. Good luck!
Bob's picture

Submitted by Bob
How come it needs to be refrigerated? All my store bought hot sauces (Tabasco, Crytal, Texas Pete, etc.)can be kept in the cabinet.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Because we can't account for the cleanliness of other folks' kitchens, how they make the hot sauce, and the pH of everyone's finished sauce, we instruct people to refrigerate. Commercial hot sauce manufacturers have very strict safety guidelines and equipment that ensures everything is sanitized. We're just trying to err on the side of safety. If you make your hot sauce and know that you did everything safely and that the pH is low enough, feel free to store your sauce at room temp.
Dave Follett's picture

Submitted by Dave Follett
Thank you Jim for the recipie. Thank you John and Meg for your numerous comments. I had my jar sealed before I viewed all the comments.
Mickey's picture

Submitted by Mickey
Its been just over 2 weeks and nothing is happening. Followed the directions specifically??????
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hi Mickey. I wouldn't worry just yet. Sometimes ferments need to be jump-started a little, especially during the fall and winter (cooler temps generally mean slower fermentation). I would get some plain yogurt with live cultures and allow some whey to accumulate on top. Pour that thin, cloudy liquid into your pepper mash. It sounds strange, but the bacteria in yogurt are essentially the same bacteria you want in your pepper mash. Give it a good stir and wait. We had a similar issue with a batch we made this summer. After adding some whey and waiting a bit, it started fermenting like crazy! I hope this works for you.
matt's picture

Submitted by matt
Do we need salt? I am on low salt diet and made about a half gallon of tobasco sauce without using salt or much vinegar. Fermented well for about three weeks and tastes great! My concern is preservation: will it keep without the salt? I have a lot so it will be around a while.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
The short version is that yes, it is possible to ferment without salt. Salt is almost always added to prevent the growth of unwanted bacteria and promote lactobacillus growth, but you can make salt-free ferments (see Sandor Katz's book Wild Fermentation--he talks a bit about salt-free or low salt ferments). My one concern is keeping the hot sauce at room temp. I would refrigerate it if I were you. Without salt or much vinegar, it definitely won't keep as long and certainly not at room temp.
Nick's picture

Submitted by Nick
Hello, my fermenting friends! This may have been addressed before, but would the recently strained pepper mash from one batch of sauce make for a good starter in a new project? I've been reserving this by-product for rubs and possibly to dry in a dehydrator in order to make my own cayenne-like ground spices; it just occurred to me that it should still support the bacterial culture of the initial batch. Thanks!
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
In theory that sounds right, Nick. I think the strained mash should still have some moisture in it, though. It might be too late to do this, but some of the mash plus a little of the fermented pepper liquid would be a perfect starter. I wouldn't use it after the vinegar and such has been added, but it should definitely work prior to that.
Matt's picture

Submitted by Matt
I bought a boat load of peppers and quickly mashed them all and added salt to begin to ferment. The mix was habenero, chitlepin, jalepeno, guajillo, and maybe cayennes. I have had them fermenting in my pantry since the summer, now December. This is a very deep complex tasting mash, and I want to run it through the mill to get the "sauce" out to begin to use. I used a very high ratio of salt to peppers. With it being mashed and past the point of fermenting, would there be any worries of eating the sauce.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
I wouldn't worry about it. As long as you used proper food safety techniques--a.k.a. common sense ;)--, observed active fermentation, and haven't seen any rampant mold growth (a little mold is okay, but you want to remove it as soon as you notice it), you should be good to go.
Jody McFarland's picture

Submitted by Jody McFarland
Another question as to whether my attempt is still good. Back on page 3, I had posed some questions about airlock stuff. That was back in July 2014. It never formed any kinds of mold and to my knowledge, never started to bubble in any way. Meg mentioned sometimes it can take quite a while to get started, so I put it in a dark stop on the back of a hallway cupboard and forgot about it until now. It looks exactly the same as it did when I put it in there 6 (pushing 7) months ago. I read through the rest of the posts here and saw mentioned if it was bad it would smell like garbage. It does not smell bad, but it's been a long time, so just wondering if I can still make something out of it. As a reminder, it has been under complete lock down under an airlock the entire time, so no outside air has entered it until I took the lid off today to smell it. Thank you
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hi Jody! Since I can't look at or smell your hot sauce, there's no way I can tell if it's good or not. I would still advise that smell and appearance are great indicators of safety. If it smells like hot, fermented peppers--a little sour and very spicy--it's *probably* fine. As they say, the nose knows. If there's no mold growth or yeast colonies (what most people refer to as "scum") on top, it's fine (and even if there is some mold growth or yeast activity, it might still be fine, but a thick mat of mold is bad news--sounds like you don't have a mold problem, so that's promising). Since you used an airlock, it's probably okay. But again, I have to use a disclaimer and say that I can't promise your hot sauce is good--the things I mentioned above are simply indicators. If you have a pH meter or can get some pH strips, the pH should be below 4.0. The final test is to taste a little. It should taste spicy, a little sour, but with no off flavors.
Joe.'s picture

Submitted by Joe.
I been making a vinegar chile sauce for while, but never fermented. I only done chiles in vinegar sealed and left on my fridge. My question is can you ferment dried chiles that you soak in water until reconstituted then follow the recipe or does it have to be fresh? Because i dry my remaining crop and/or smoke before the end of summer for later use.
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Hi Joe. I don't think you can ferment dried, reconstituted chiles, but you can still make a great hot sauce from them. For this technique, though, they have to be fresh.
masseygoose's picture

Submitted by masseygoose
Hi, I have made a batch of fermented sauce and I am looking to bottle it to give as gifts. It's been fermenting for over a month now and seems to have bottomed out. If I was to bottle it without adding vinegar how much of an effect will there be on shelf life? I've read the comments previous. Are you saying that any bacteria in the mash will have already died off? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Cheers, Jack
john's picture

Submitted by john
Sorry about the late response Jack! Not adding vinegar will have a crucial effect on shelf-life! The vinegar (in addition to contributing flavor) lowers the pH of the sauce so that bad things will not grow in it after the ferment is done. The lactobacilli that fermented the peppers has indeed died off, which opens the door for other bacteria to move in. Use the vinegar!
smita's picture

Submitted by smita
Hello! I don't know if comments are allowed anymore....I really want to do this. But without the wine to on my first try. If I don't want to use wine what liquid and how much should I use? The recipes and procedures on the internet are all over the place. No liquid, only salt, big differences in proportion of salt, sealed container left untouched...or ferment open to air and stirred everyday wildly contradicting each other. I want to try yours closely but without wine. Please let me know how to start. Thank you!
john's picture

Submitted by john
Water is a fine substitute for the wine, Smita. As long as you keep the peppers submerged, open-air fermenting is fine, or use an air lock or "bubbler" so the CO2 can escape. Have fun!
Tom's picture

Submitted by Tom
I am starting my first batch next week. Is rinsing the peppers necessary before adding to fermentation jar? I could only find red wine in the organic section of my market. It read "sulphites not detectable". Can I use pink Himalayan salt vs. sea salt? I could not find "unrefined sea salt". Last of all, this is a great site. Thanks to all the great posts.
john's picture

Submitted by john
Thanks Tom! The Himalayan pink salt will work just fine. We haven't tried this with red wine, so I cannot vouch for the end result, but it will ferment with no problems. Hope it turns out well!
tricia's picture

Submitted by tricia
Help! Sulfites... Well I have this lovely bottle of pepper mash sitting here doing nothing.Turns out that the lovely german reisling that I used has sulfites. I thought I had translated the label to read no sulfites but that was an error.Is there a way to salvage this batch? It looks and smells great but is just sitting there with no bubbles happening after 10days.
Maggie's picture

Submitted by Maggie
This happened to me too. Did you ever figure out how to salvage your mash?
Matth's picture

Submitted by Matth
Hi john, i'm going to do a jar of sauce. I'm an expert in brewing beer but nothing about lactofermentation of peppers. In beer i avoid air exchange (only exit of CO2). Is the same here? Can I close the jar (maybe with a bubbler on top)? Thank you!
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
We've started using an airlock in our ferments. When we were first getting into fermentation, we were using the open crock method for a lot of things. You can get great results that way. But now we prefer to use an airlock because it increases the chances of success and prevents oxidation. We got these nifty little airlock mason jar lids, and they've been great.
Claudia's picture

Submitted by Claudia
I made Tabasco sauce and my husband says it is too hot. What can I do now to tame it down?
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Well my first instinct is to say dilute it, but I'm not sure with what. You could dilute it with vinegar and use it more as a spicy vinegar than a hot sauce (would probably be great on cooked greens). You could potentially add tomato paste and garlic (sauteed a little) and blend it up with the sauce. You could possibly even follow the lead of many Mexican hot sauces that blend up toasted pumpkin seeds or peanuts with hot peppers to make a fiery, creamy salsa. You might also think about diluting it with some orange juice or mango puree to make a Caribbean-style hot sauce. Granted, at the end of this you won't have a Tabasco-style sauce anymore, but it will probably at least be tasty.
Nick from Canada's picture

Submitted by Nick from Canada
Hey guys, loved this blog and all of the comments. Question, I pureed the peppers and added water instead of wine and added salt by weight to mash. Its fermenting well but there isn't a lot of separation, the liquid is about an inch and half compared to about 5 inches of solids. My question is, do you think I should add water, if so, how much and should I maintain the 2% salt ration? Thanks!
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
I actually don't think you need to add any water at all. There won't be much separation, which is fine. Glad you enjoyed the blog! Let us know if you have any more questions.
mate's picture

Submitted by mate
Hi,im reading to your comments and you are realy helpfull. Im fermenting hot peppers for over two years and i have few questions..First.. i put 4 % of salt by mash and in the end of fermenting, sauce is very salty and vey acidic..doyou have some experience,im afraid if i put 2% of salt the nasties (bad bacteria) canget in ?? help
john's picture

Submitted by john
This is a tough one to answer... We can say this: we add 1.5% salt to cabbage when we make sauerkraut, and we have never had a problem with "baddies." Obviously, this is a slightly different ferment, and, naturally, 4-5% salt is going to provide you--and the lactic acid bacteria--with some "insurance" against competing organisms. Of course, if the "baddies" start winning, it won't be a secret: off smells, no fermentation bubbles, and a proliferation of dark-hued particles or strange films on the top. You might run the risk of ruining some peppers, but we're pretty confident that 2% salt will be okay, especially if you sterilize everything and minimize exposure... perhaps an airlock or two would be a good upgrade (if you don't already have them).
matew1212's picture

Submitted by matew1212
yeah, on the end i put 3% of himalayan salt. Do you have any experience with xantham gum. I made my perfect sauce but in a mean time solids and liquid separate so i have read that i should put some in :)
meg's picture

Submitted by meg
Xanthan gum will help prevent the sauce from separating. Put your sauce in a blender and add a pinch of xanthan gum at a time while blending the sauce. After each addition, stop the blender and see if it's thickened enough. Be really careful--adding too much xanthan can make the sauce slimy. I would hate for your awesome hot sauce to be ruined by xanthan gum! You could also just leave it as-is and shake it before using it.

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Tart Greens With Apples and Pecans

Prepare:
            Buttermilk Honey Dressing (see recipe below)
Combine in a salad bowl:
           4 cups bite-sized pieces arugula
...