Ask HN: What is your favorite hot sauce?

While it's on the sweet side (typical habanero sweet/fruitiness), this scotch bonnet pepper sauce has a wonderfully rich pepper flavor.

http://www.bushabrowne.com/product_pukka_hot_sauce.php

Sriracha and standard Chinese red pepper sauce are staples that should always be available.

However, if heat is the goal without compromising flavor, nothing beats Bailiff Brutality.

http://www.honestfoods.com/bailbrutsal.html

It claims to be a salsa, but don't be fooled. It's hotter than Dave's Insanity by volume. This sauce is insidious. The chunks of roasted pepper and tomato trick you into putting a couple spoonfuls on your burrito. The oil base delays the burn... allowing you to eat more. At about 10+ minutes after eating the "salsa", the Capsicium filled oil finally starts to hit the nerves and it hits you with at least a half hour of increasing pain. This sauce gives you time to think about the situation you put yourself in before hitting you with the pepper heat. And then it does it to you again six hours later.

But the best part - which you're not going to believe - is the it really does have an outstanding roasted tomato/pepper flavor. I like it for the taste, not the insane heat.

Best thread ever. I'm about to open up a container of Del Real "Salsa de Molcajete Roja" that I got from costco, that's pretty good. My favorite is from a local place here in Santa Barbara - "Hot Salsa" from the Santa Cruz Market - so hot, you cant stop eating it!

Marie sharps, imported from Belize. Made from prickly pears and available on Amazon. Comes in many variations, but all are smooth and the prickly pear provides a nice base to give them all a great flavor. This particular one is my favorite:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0000DG56O

I've been waiting for this question for some time now!

The hot sauce I have in my desk at work is

Arizona Pepper's organic harvest jalapeño pepper sauce.

Contains red ripened jalapeño peppers, vinegar and salt and tastes exactly how I imagine hot sauce would.

I also like the habanero version from the same brand for its smoked flavor.

Both are sugar free which is important for me and taste amazing without being overwhelming.

My favorite is Desi Hot Sauce by [Curry Up Now][http://curryupnow.com].

1/22 is [National Hot Sauce Day][https://m.facebook.com/nationalhotsauceday/], btw.

Tabasco for anything Mexican-y, or with eggs. Franks (x-tra hot) for anything American, like pizza. Sriracha for anything Asian.

Lesser known brands are always good too, but I can never go wrong with this holy trinity.

Lately, I've been absolutely in love with Trader Joe's brand habenero salsa. It's perfect on everything.

Aardvark Habanero from Secret Aardvark ( http://secretaardvark.com ). It's not overly spicy, but has a lot of flavor. If you're in the Pacific Northwest, it may be at your local grocer.

After much trepidation and finally trying it, I like Cholula's original sauce the best of all of the hot sauces I have tried. I may try the others though.

http://www.cholula.com/

I have two favorites. There's the basic sriracha (and various gourmet knock-offs). I also really like the smoked chipotle version of Tabasco. It's cheap, not super-hot, and has a terrific flavor.

Gochujang

I prefer a bit of sweetness in my sauce. Sour.. not so much.

Encona hot pepper sauce.

It has a great kick to it, but also a really deep and unique flavour. At university I went through a bottle a week!

Sriracha

Also hijacking this to ask for a good BBQ sauce? :)

Salsa Lizano - From Costa Rica. Not overly spicy but goes well with everything! Available on Amazon.

Tabasco.

Mojo Picon from Canary Island is also great. Not quite hot, but Papas arrugas con mojo picón is a gratis dish.

Tabasco for general hot sauce

Tabasco Chipotle for Tacos, can't eat them without it now.

Blair's After Death Sauce. Very hot but with good flavor.

"Piqué" sauce, exclusively at Sol Food bodega in San Rafael. Cholula available at Safeway and everywhere else.