How to make fermented hot sauce (2021) | Hacker News Reader

How to make fermented hot sauce (2021)

seriouseats.com

335 pointsKaibeezy175 comments

I just opened one 2 weekends ago. I bought a kit (because of the really nice bottles), but then ignored the instructions and found significantly better recipes online. First time I've fermented one, and it came out gloriously.

I'm proud of the result because it tastes nothing like other hot sauces I've had (and there have been very many!), but also doesn't taste the least bit strange or out-of-place. I expected it to taste like Tabasco, but it came out more like Hunan because of a much darker flavour.

I also make regular hot sauces with fruits and herbs that I forage from the neighbourhood. My current dipper is a slightly smokey medium heat made with morita, cascabel and guajira peppers, plum-like damson fruit and some wild mint that I lovingly call "ditch-mint" because that's where I found it. It would probably work fermented, but I've only tried fermenting once so far.

Once you get the connection with how certain ingredients alter the taste and texture when combined, you can pretty much wing it as you go. The more complex, the better. There is a balance, and you quickly learn flavourful vinegars / citrus, and sweeteners (brown sugar/honey/maple) will balance out just about any amount of spices and herbs. It's very rewarding if you like hot sauces, dips, marinades, etc, and the results will pretty much always make you feel like an old pro.

> but then ignored the instructions and found significantly better recipes online

How did you compare them?

He did a peer-reviewed, double-blind study with 1000 test subjects over the course of 10 years.

Only 1000 subjects? I hope it was a large effect size!

The included recipes were of the "introductory level" type that would of course be passable, but devoid of any complexity. I've made enough sauces now that I can make a pretty good guess on how it'll turn out with various ingredients.

Care to share some links to your favorites?

I don't keep them around since I mainly use them more for inspiration. But the non-fermented dipper I mentioned was based on the one here: https://plantedandpicked.com/habanero-plum-hot-sauce. I've described the replacement ingredients I made in other comments, so I won't list them here. Just wing it. That's what I do beyond using recipes as a safe-guard for portioning.

I will point out though that I used 1/2 the amount of habanero, and then I replace (plus a bit more) the other half with other peppers to give it a fuller flavour, and more about a pleasant lingering warmth than scorching-face heat. I really enjoy the different types of heat different peppers can impart, and I really pay attention to the flavour itself to make sauces that taste like they fit some sort of "theme" or locale. (That is to say, I probably wouldn't mix Scotch Bonnet with Pequin, because I don't think they would work all that well together, but there are combinations that are simply incredible.)

Pretty much the only thing I really stick to verbatim is the spices and some of the herbs. And I use the recipe volumes (tsps or cups or whatever) to gauge what I need to do to ensure the finished sauce will be recognizable and balanced appropriately even if the ingredients I used are not the same, but merely "similar."

As long as you know your flavours, and you don't over-use any given ingredient, it is really hard to go wrong.

Do you have a recommendation on a kit to use?

Not really. I literally only bought this because I was interested in the bottles that came with the kit. Well, I looked because I'm interested in the subject, but I bought it for the bottles because they are nicer looking than what I was using prior. The kit came with a sampling of different types of dried peppers, so I'm using them for things as well.

If you want to go for a kit, find one with several types of peppers. There is a lot of variety in flavour and heat levels. I mentioned cascabel, for example... they're not particularly hot, but instantly make you think "Mexican!" when you taste it. Even with kits, you still have to buy all the other ingredients, so I think it is actually better to just go that route and use ingredients you already have or buy with groceries.

If you are going to ferment, I did use a water bubbler that I got from a wine brewing place. They are not expensive, since they are simply clear plastic valves and a rubber sealing ring. Just add water. I've seen them for super cheap on Wish dot com even. I don't use a pH tester (although I may in the future), but after 2 weeks, just taste it. You'll know if it is ready because it'll taste very different than how it tasted when you bottled it. Chance of it still fermenting after 2 weeks is nearly zero anyway. At least that's the general consensus I read online, and it worked out that way for my first attempt.

I recommend doing vinegar based pepper sauces to gain experience with how things taste, etc. You'll know very quickly how they turn out. With fermenting, there's a long agonizing wait. Mind you, my first attempt came out so well, I am glad I made both in the same day, so I wasn't without some homemade sauce while I waited for the fermenting one. And with fermented pepper sauces, you use fewer ingredients, so maybe they always turn out well.

Nice! Thanks for the heads up. I'll take a look at some kits. I'm more interested in the equipment than the peppers or recipes. I've done sourcrout in the past, used a big 50 gallon plastic container and let it ferment for a week and then into the jars it went.

But I'm really curious about venturing into hot pepper sauces.

> I did use a water bubbler that I got from a wine brewing place. [...] Chance of it still fermenting after 2 weeks is nearly zero anyway.

No need to guess/reason about it if you're using a water-filled airlock - if it's still bubbling it's still fermenting.

In homebrewing people generally leave it for fermentation to stop/slow to a rough rate, since even if you're repeating a recipe it's not that repeatable - the temperature (other than in extreme home setups!) and yeast activity/count (best you can do is buy the same thing 'fresh' both times) in particular. It's not really a problem, it just means it doesn't make sense to stick dogmatically to x weeks exactly.

(Commercially it matters of course, and they control temperature and employ microbiologists to deal with it, and many other variables so they can hit consistent production time, flavour, and ABV, every time.)

Exactly. I mentioned it specifically become some sites I have found talk about pH balance and whatnot as if it is ultra important, and I think if you're using a bubbler it's all a moot point anyway. But someone who doesn't know could easily be convinced to buy those things when unless you're commercial, you don't need them. I've made wine, cider, beer, yogurt and kombucha as well, and haven't yet poisoned anyone.

As long as you keep oxygen away, and don't go overkill on the additional spices and herbs, it's really hard to go wrong.

Which better recipe did you follow?

I literally Google Image surf and choose one that looks good and contains peppers that are the same/ similar/ compatible with the pepper(s) I plan on using. Then I use it as a guide so my ingredient portions would be reasonably correct. I also tend to stay reasonably faithful to the spices used, since that's where a lot of the characteristic flavour besides the pepper itself comes from. I don't follow the recipes entirely faithfully since I use ingredients from my garden and from the neighbourhood, and a lot of time they are quite atypical. Like the Damson I used - those are like little black plums. But literally any fruit even remotely like them will work. And I love using Perilla when mint is called for because it imparts a bright red that helps the sauce look "dangerous." Ironic that the hottest looking colour comes from the coolest tasting ingredient. Of course I use other mints as well. Like peppers, there is so much variation to be had.

For example, I didn't have enough wine vinegar for my most recent dipper that I mentioned, so I mixed what I had with a little cooking rice wine and about 1/8 cup of sherry, and then added less salt than was originally called for since cooking wine tends to already be salty. And it came out quite yummy.

Mind posting a recipe you liked?

I posted a link for another comment in the thread. I replaced certain ingredients, but it otherwise what I made was based entirely on the recipe. I used different peppers (half of what was called for, then a half plus a bit more of some different peppers), and completely changed the vinegar ingredient. Also I used a plum-like fruit instead of plum, but they're really close in texture and flavour.

Part of what I like about that particular recipe is that the coriander seeds are really forward in the flavour.

I started making fermented hot sauce during COVID in 2020. There's a fancy grocery store near me that sells scorpions, ghosts, and reapers, as well as burdock, tamarind, mango, etc. I usually fermented for a week, and I've tried longer with little difference. I made an entire spreadsheet full of recipes that I tried, but ultimately I thought the fermented sour flavor overwhelmed everything. So, I started making them without fermenting, but with a little cooking to help break down some of the fruits and veggies and blend the flavors, and suddenly everything tasted 10x better. I was surprised, because for some reason I got it in my head that hot sauce must be fermented, when that's totally not true. Anyway, my $0.02 on fermenting hotsauce.

The fermentation slows down after a few days so the difference between one and two weeks isn't huge but the difference between a week and 4 months is significant. Consider that Worcestershire sauce is mostly fermented onions and fish... It's amazing what a couple years of aging can do. Also, there's no reason your final product can't be a mix of both! Get the best of both worlds.

Yeah was going to say the same thing. I've been making kombucha for a while, and I have a process down where at the final stage I blend kombucha from various fermentation stages to get the mix of tartness, sweetness, fruit flavor, and alcohol content I'm looking for.

It doesn't need to be binary. You can always mix cooked sauce with fermented to get the flavor profile you are looking for.

I was making kombucha too! Again, too vinegary. I wasn't sure if it was too much heat, too much sugar, etc. But again I was only doing 1-2 weeks. Good idea to mix.

I'm not the expert but have access to some ;). if it's turning into vinegar you've fermented it for too long.

It never occurred to me to mix, thanks!

No prob. Often metal guitarists have a some portion of the amps on stage pumping out clean, undistorted sound because it adds a ton of depth. Occasionally this is super useful in cooking, too. Mixing raw and roasted garlic in an aoli is a pro move, as is mixing cooked and raw fruit in a coulis or sorbet being sure to add enough acid to brighten it back up.

I always mixed a little phaser into my dry bass mix, for that Tony Levin feel.

"It'll phase, it'll fuzz, it's flexible. Feel those frets."

Totally different artist, but thanks for reminding me that I haven't listened to Tony Levin in a really long time :-)

I'd hesitate to even call myself a musical dilitante over the past decade, but it was my primary medium from my teens to mid twenties. Having graduated culinary school in my late twenties and now getting my first actual degree– a design BFA– a bit over a decade later, I'm often struck by the similarities among creative endeavors. Conceptual elements like texture, metaphorical or otherwise, can interface with so many of the same underlying emotional triggers in such interesting ways. These realizations certainly would have made me a better musician. Too focused on the composition and not enough on the feel. I think it was because my first guitar teacher, my dad, is a mechanical engineer. He's a far better musician than I am, but he's just used to communicating ideas in cut and dried technical terms.

Technical stuff is important, but for menu development, I'd partner with an experienced creative musician who can confidently manipulate abstract concepts over someone who'd memorized a food science text book, any day.

> it’s amazing what a couple years of aging can do

At a certain point don’t the cultures you’re fostering run out of food?

it’s cultures all the way down

Generally at some point the microbes die but some of the enzymes they've produced are still active and slowly breaking things down into tastier chemicals.

I see, thanks!

It's not just microbial activity. Chemical/physical ingredient breakdown is important, too.

Visited a manufacturing facility of one of the big Louisiana hot sauce brands, and they basically have a got a guy that mixes all these pepper mashes of varying ages to get their desired flavor profile - similar to blended scotches! (No idea if these are fermented)

Cool! Almost certainly fermented.

> fancy grocery store near me that sells

I'd love to have one of these. What's the store?

One huge advantage of fermentation of peppers is the fact that it becomes preserved for many months if kept in the fridge.

I also started growing peppers, and this was the only way we could keep the many gallons of hot sauce a tiny bed of peppers can produce.

It does change the taste, which for some, might be a downside.

You can neutralize some of the acid by adding alkaline ingredients. Sodium bicarbonate or calcium hydroxide are two common ways. But this may neutralize the pH to the point where the sauce isn't naturally preserved from molding or otherwise spoiling.

I find fermenting more trouble than it's worth, even if you like the taste (which I personally don't overly do).

I make a lot of hot sauce (grow my own peppers) and usually just make a mash, boil that for a bit, and then essentially can it. If the pH is low enough and you pasteurize everything & sanitize your equipment, it's shelf stable for a long time.

I grew up on home made hot sauce and I don't think anyone ever fermented anything. I just remember ground chili peppers, salt, chop up whatever firm fruits (green mangoes, etc.) or vegetables were on hand and add enough vinegar or lime juice so it wasn't dry. Put that in a jar and there's your sauce.

Would you mind sharing your favorite recipe? <3

A link to a great resource for learning about peppers and fermentation, replete with many good recipes: https://m.youtube.com/c/Chillichump (Chilli Chump)

Edit for intriguing experiment of mine: I originally began experimenting with fermented chillis due to a suspected h-pylori infection. My reasons were a) h-pylori seems to swim away from capsaicin, possibly encouraging it to develop an excessive biofilm, thus contributing to its own isolation, b) capsaicin, despite its apparent burning effect, can be helpful with ulcers due in part to encouraging healthy mucous formation and c) the lactobacillus and other probiotic factors involved. I believe this was critical in abolishing a rather nasty ulcer that nearly debilitated me.

r/fermentation is another solid resource. Definitely search the archives over there for a ton of valuable info.

Chillichump is great! His enthusiasm, depth and breadth of content, and general manner really got me into growing peppers and making hot sauce during the pandemic. I've got a dozen different varieties growing on my balcony right now!

In Central America, most restaurants and bars serving local food makes their own "Chilero" - it's pretty much a fermented hot condiment which often has more whole pieces of ingredients that aren't just chiles, such as various sliced/diced vegetables and quite often cabbage. It's something like a hot sauerkraut a lot of the time and very easy to make in a variety of spice ranges - but if it's only a little spicy, or not spicy at all (You find this closer to El Salvador), it's usually going to get called "Encurtido" and is also very good with more of a herbal flavor such as from oregano and thyme.

One time I took a girl out to a neighbourhood bar for lunch and it was filled with a bunch of older people, when we got our food and after some of the patrons actually bought us some drinks they busted out the place's special bhut jolika chilero. Haha I swear they made it just to watch whoever was new to the place burn and sweat for a laugh.

I think interestingly that the proportion of people who like spicy food vs people who don't is about the same between North and South/Central America.

Ummm, that sounds awesome! I don't suppose you have a favorite recipe, or should I just search for "Chilero" and "Encurtido" recipes?

It almost sounds like a Central American spice palette version of Kimchee, which is rad as F.

Yeah it's pretty much that.

The recipes I'm finding in English are garbage. Try searching 'chilero receta' or 'chilera receta' and you should find something in Spanish to work off of in google translate. Even better to search is 'chilero fermentado'.

It's interesting to think that people might have been making some form of this much longer longer than they've been making kimchi with chilis, because chilis are originally from Central American. Wikipedia:

> Kimchi has been a staple in Korean culture, but historical versions were not a spicy dish. Early records of kimchi do not mention garlic or chili pepper. Chili peppers, now a standard ingredient in kimchi, had been unknown in Korea until the early seventeenth century due to its being a New World crop. Chili peppers, originally native to the Americas, were introduced to East Asia by Portuguese traders. The first mention of chili pepper is found in Jibong yuseol, an encyclopedia published in 1614. Sallim gyeongje, a 17‒18th century book on farm management, wrote on kimchi with chili peppers. However, it was not until the 19th century that the use of chili peppers in kimchi was widespread. The recipes from early 19th century closely resemble today's kimchi.

Nevermind, I answered my own question =) I found an Encurtido recipe made with red onions and I think I'll try it:

https://lacooquette.com/encurtido-curtido/

Thanks for bringing this up. Never heard of it, now I have =)

EDIT: this one isn't fermented, but at least I know what to look for. Anyways, thanks! My fermenting jars are ready to go!

Yeah, there's more fermented versions that use maybe only a bit of vinegar for preservation purposes for sure. It's really quite a lot of different kinds you can make, the one in that recipe is on the milder end of the curtido/chilero spectrum. One I learned in the Caribbean which you find more often in Panama is mostly just scotch bonnets, garlic, onions and lemon juice as a base which is insanely hot (The woman in this video is having a hard time with making it even, and it's pretty much just throwing things in a blender and letting it sit for a while so don't worry if you don't speak the language):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72eSB8d1gt4

I search 'chilero fermentado' for results.

My wife has been making something very similar - I didn't know it had a name. Goes well on all kinds of things, but it's a must on fish tacos.

I'm a huge fan of eating ceviche with it. Any other kinds of sauce on ceviche are gross, I have no idea why people put ketchup and mayo on that stuff when there's usually great chilero to pair with it.

In El Salvador it's called curtido, and it's very simple to make. Traditionally it's not meant to be spicy. Usually served with pupusas. Some people add jalapenos or serranos when making curtido to add some heat to it; varies from place to place, family to family.

I love pupusas and never make the curtido spicy if it's time for those. It would mess with people's expectations haha

To me the flavor of a good curtido is from fresh herbs

yeah the herbs make a big difference. A little spicy is nice, especially because the tomato sauce it's served with is usually not spicy at all.

I use this system [0], which is basically foolproof and is easy as pie. The end results are amazing. Right now I have two jars of blended up hatch chiles (with onion, garlic, carrots, and 4% salt by weight) on the counter, probably two more months to go on them. It's a super fun way to make food.

[0] https://nourishedessentials.com/products/the-easy-fermenter

I love carrots pikcled and fermented, what makes them so special?

My grandmother used to pickle carrots. She said it was the perfect mix of sweet, sour, a bit of salt and a lot of love. :)

Picked this up, thank you!

I am from Louisiana. I dislike the basic Tabasco sauce. While the claim that tabasco sauce comes from fermented peppers is technically true, the sauce tastes raw and far too vinegar-forward compared to most hot sauces produced in and around Louisiana. They claim that they ferment their peppers for 8 years but I have my doubts just based on the sheer amount of heat.

One of the main reasons we like the sauces, by the way, is that our food tends to be really rich and earthy. Think red beans or gumbo or white beans over jambalaya. The acid cuts through the fat.

Crystal hot sauce always seems right on my attempts at dirty rice. That’s the level of heat and type of flavor you mean, yes?

My go-to is Louisiana brand. A little less raw heat, a little less vinegar, but more body and a better mouthfeel. I buy large bottles of the stuff and my kids tear it up, especially when eating things like red beans or pig feet.

For some reason Louisiana brand is usually not to be found in the joints that cater to tourists.

What I really never see outside the state is Cajun Chef. Saltier than most but may be an acquired taste (I like it)

You can find Louisiana brand at Walmart in Minnesota. Minnesota's official hot sauce is ketchup, so that's saying a lot!

Crystal extra hot is the best big name sauce out there IMHO.

I love Tabasco, but there’s a trick to it: think of it as a really good seasoning vinegar rather than a really thin hot sauce.

It stays in my fridge for use on breakfast eggs and potatoes, where it excels. That “diner breakfast” flavor in a bottle.

Tabasco has its applications. By my taste buds, no other sauce works quite right for clam chowder or louis dressing. Otherwise, I agree with you.

you may be aware, but tobasco isn't the only hot sauce louisiana is famous for. There's also Louisiana hot sauce which is also tart and vinegary but not that weird tobasco kick, and buffalo "wing" sauce was also invented in louisiana.

Tobasco peppers grow like wildfire out here, but so do cayenne and jalapeno. I'm assuming that means almost all peppers will, but i've only grown 3 varieties so far. I intend to grow about a dozen varieties next season, already have the seeds.

I make sauerkraut in an old clear Costco nut container, the kind with the large mouth on top and a threaded lid. Any plastic container with a large lid works.

On a kitchen scale, place the container and then reset tare weight to zero out. Add cabbage previously chopped using a food processor, then add a little (about 1/4 cup) spring water (not tap water) and stir in 3% by weight of kosher salt. Leave it on the counter for two weeks and release the lid some to let out gas. Use clean spoon and stir it a couple times over the two weeks to keep it mixed. The bright green cabbage turns more tan, then move it into the fridge.

Toss it onto some on salads or sandwiches, etc. It is one of the easiest healthy yummy things to make.

Why does the salt have to be kosher?

It doesn't, but kosher salt is a lot easier to work with.

Is it Diamond Crystal or Morton’s in the recipe? That’s a big difference in NaCl.

if you are measuring by weight rather than volume they contain the same amount of sodium

Isn't 3% by weight always right, even if you get there by shaving chips from a giant rock salt crystal or whatever?

Ah, right! So many recipes!

Koreans use a similar coarse-grained salt to produce kimchi, for much the same reasons.

The "corn" in "corned beef" refers to coarse grains of salt.

there's also other salts in it besides sodium chloride. for some reason my brain tells me that pink salt is saltpeter, but that's potassium nitrate, and wikipedia says pink salt is sodium nitrate.

So now i'm having a slight issue with my brain.

Close. When I was a kid we used to make gunpowder (charcoal, sulfur, potassium nitrate) with saltpeter that we got from the drug store. The story to tell was "my mom is making ham." But that was whitish.

Hmmm. I do have some pink salt that I used to cure ham last fall. OK, just checked and the package says sodium nitrate.

I read some time back about an article (and wish I had bookmarked it) about the "types" of salt. That particular one classified [non-millable] salts into three different categories.

Table salt: the fine, iodine-added salt you get in plastic bottles. Comes with anti-caking additives to prevent clogging.

Finishing salt: large flakes of sea salt, mostly used by professional kitchens to add the final touch to a dish.

Kosher salt: a sort of catch-all name for salt without additives, more coarse than table salt but small and granular enough to roll off of an unsuspecting surface.

Based on what I use personally, I think both of my choices fall between the last two categories. Maldon sea salt for most cooking uses (disregard the brand, Maldon just happens to be plenty available in the UK), and extremely coarse sea salt / rock salt for filling the mill. The sea salt flakes are fine enough to crush easily between the fingers, so in practice it probably behaves much like you'd get from a "kosher salt".

The added iodine in non-kosher salt probably affects microbiological growth in undesirable/unpredictable/unexpected ways.

In North America, the coarse salt with zero additives is called "kosher" salt because the Jews used it to brine meat. It's generally approved by a Rabbi but even if it weren't actually Kosher, it would still be called kosher.

Some salt (table salt) has additives like iodine or anti caking agents that you don't want in your ferment because it will cause it to be cloudy (or even more cloudy).

There's also some people who claim the iodine will inhibit fermentation, but studies have shown that it doesn't have much of an effect [1].

1 - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S07400...

I think it just has a discoloring effect.

Kosher salt contains an anticaking agent. My box of Morton Kosher salt list Salt and Yellow Prussiate of Soda (anticaking agent) and so does my box of Windsor Kosher salt.

Oh you're right! I've got a box of coarse salt as well and it doesn't have any additives - interesting as it and the kosher salt are about the same size.

Kosher, in this sense, describes the texture of the salt (coarse-grained), not necessarily that the salt is kosher in and of itself (though it usually is).

It's used for producing kosher meat.

mostly to avoid any iodine which could interfere with the fermentation process. I suppose one could use pickling salt too. Maybe regular table salt is fine, but that's what I use since I keep it on hand.

Here's a tip, you can remove chlorine from tap water by spinning it for a minute in the blender. Then it won't interfere with fermentation.

Never heard this, nice tip! I just leave it out overnight if I am removing chlorine.

You can also boil water to remove chlorine. Stove or electric tea kettle works.

But not chloramine, so if you need water that is free of chlorine and chloramine, check what your water provider uses.

Is there any effective process other than carbon filtration for removal of this?

Any aquarium store will sell additives that remove chloramine. Campden tablets work too. As I understand it, not all carbon filters remove chloramine — you need catalytic carbon filters. Chloramine reduction is frequently advertised as a feature.

Could you provide a source for how this works? I'm surprised this would work and have not found anything from a few google searches.

Chlorine in water evaporates into gas over time; you can leave a bucket out for 24h or so and make it safe for aquarium use.

Blender aerates it rapidly; you can do the same with a bubbler. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/330203637_De-chlori...

My guess is that the blender lowers the fluid pressure by cavitation and the dissolved chlorine gas escapes as bubbles.

If you're new to fermenting, I highly recommend making tepache: https://www.thespruceeats.com/pineapple-tepache-recipe-40787...

It's quite easy to make, although if you bottle it, you do need to worry about overpressurization causing the bottles to explode. I always tend to err on the side of caution so it's just a slightly fizzy drink.

Agree! Tepache is easy to make and nice because it is using up "scraps".

Yeah, exactly! Pineapple peel and core, plus some sugar and tap water is all you need.

I just tried this for the first time a few weeks ago. In Colombia they call it chicha de piña. The stuff I had wasn't bottled, just left on the counter in a large covered crock to ferment for a few days. Sweetened with panela and some spices like cinnamon and maybe anise.

Yup! If you want it more carbonated you can bottle it.

I can't get panela around here so I just use brown sugar.

I've made this a few times and it's pretty nice!

Great, something else that I'm compelled to make. While I'm still tipsy from finishing the last bottle of homebrew ginger ale. Sigh!

When fermenting pickles and peppers, mine always end up being too salty; I tend to want to error on the side of being too salty to make sure its a safe ferment, but then I have to soak the pickles in potable water until they aren't too salty anymore. I'll get it right someday.

I suspect that using volume measurements instead of mass might be part of the problem.

Using volume measurement for salt is a bit problematic, because different brand of salt come with different sizes. A teaspoon of finer salt might be twice as heavy as a teaspoon of coarser salt. It's not always easy to find out that ratio between your salt and the one used by the recipe author.

I would suggest using a kitchen scale to weight the food (minus the container weight) and then add in the 3% of salt (or whatever percent you want). Using the scale made all the difference for me with getting the consistency and flavor. good luck!

Two of my most used and most useful kitchen tools are a Thermapen and a digital scale. Just being able to measure accurately makes all of the difference in cooking just about anything. A cup of flour or a teaspoon of salt can weigh very differently depending on how tightly packed or how fine the grain is, better to be exact and not risk screwing everything up.

I love Thermapens! I've been looking for an equally well built kitchen scale. Have any recommendations?

The 0.1g-precision Bluetooth scales used for coffee are decent. They all seem to share essentially the same firmware, which suggests that they come from the same ODM, and they’re decent — mostly work, only a little flakey.

If it's hot in the kitchen (I ferment on the counter so I don't forget about the ferments), I ere on the side of caution and use quite a bit of salt. After a few days I taste the brine. It should be starting to sour. If it's clearly too salty, I just add a bit of fresh water to the crock, taste again, and repeat.

I taste it every day and refrigerate the ferment once it's at the right sourness.

I wonder if the gasses could be sampled and monitored, or maybe some spectral analysis of the fluids, to find if undesirable biological activity were happening?

I use litmus paper to test acidity of the brine. Usually ends up around 3.0-3.5 ph.

Also monitor smell, bubble formation (good) and watch for bad colors (white, black, green mold on top), browning of ferment, especially near the top (bad)

Salty fermentation products are good for stir fries or soups where a little goes a long way, and you can dilute with other ingredients.

It’s so fun to ferment stuff! Yogurt and sauerkraut are good starter ferments. Kimchi too. With hot sauce make sure to wear gloves and try to remove the pith and seeds. In my experience it can make the sauce quite bitter.

Agreed! I picked up brewing kombucha over lockdown and its been a fun vehicle for trying out flavors you won't see in stores. I've made watermelon mint, lychee, mango carolina reaper (it took 2 attempts to get the heat right), and even attempted a bloody mary that went horribly wrong.

mango carolina reaper

You are God to me now...

OK, not seriously, but that does sound amazing. I love mango and I love hot peppers, including Carolina Reaper, so that sounds like something I should try.

When I make it I use 1 carton of Goya Mango Nectar and TWO reapers. Let that simmer in a pot for 20-30 minutes. Let the mixer come to room temp and mix with your kombucha brew before moving to second fermentation. It'll give a noticeable burn, but the mango counters it nicely. Don't be tough with the peppers, those TWO go a long way. My first attempt I did six because I had no gauge and it felt like I was drinking sandpaper.

When reapers are out of season, you can substitute with 6 habaneros. Same level of heat (maybe a bit less), but slightly different flavors since reapers and habaneros' fruity flavors are different.

Have you had this?

https://queenmajestyhotsauce.com/products/queen-majesty-scot...

Seriously my favorite hot sauce of all time. It would be easy to let the scotch bonnet overwhelm things, but it's such a nice balance, it's only considered a "medium" heat overall.

I haven't had that particular sauce but I use a lot of Scotch Bonnet pepper sauce in general. It's nowhere near as hot as something like Trinidad Scorpion, Naga Jolokia, or Carolina Reaper, but has a really nice flavor. I almost always use a mix of Scotch Bonnet and one of the hotter peppers to achieve the desired balance of "nice flavor" and "extreme heat".

Any tips to calm an overly cautious mind for food based tinkering like fermentation? My rational part understands that with a proper recipe and clean work there’s no more risk than from a random food locality and still … when I was young my mom was a cooking enthousiast and a great cook and she landed in the hospital with a nearly lethal food poisoning one day. That has probably shaken my senses for the more adventurous cooking like fermentation.

Fermentation is pretty much safe. Make sure you get two things right:

1. Salt. You want at least 2% by weight (vegetables and water). Recipes differ, up to 5-ish %, just follow the recipe.

2. Anaerobic. No need to fear opening the jar every now and then, but submerge the vegetables in the brine and don't stir the brine much when you open the jar (to taste it, for example). There may be white fungus on top where the brine-air line is, but that's benign. Just skim it off.

If you make sure those two conditions are met, lactobacilla (and yeast) will out-compete everything else. Especially everything dangerous.

Fermentation can be safer than raw veggies actually. just make sure you have 2%+ brine by weight of the veggies and the water and you should be ok. keep the ferment in a cooler to let the lacto bacillus do their thing at optimal temperatures.

if there is stringy/fluffy mold then your ferment went south and you should throw generally to be on the safe side. if it's more brain like white folding without wispy bits you should be ok to just skim it. (kahm yeast is harmless generally)

if you are really paranoid you can buy some pH strips to see if the lacto bacteria got the veggies down to the proper pH. botulism is basically impossible for a setup like this as long as you are following the basic guidelines and not trying to do some weird canning/fermentation setup. (botulism needs low competing bacteria[aka improper canning where you kill off all the good bacteria and leave the botulism spores], low salinity [more canning], anaerobic environment[technically this can happen in a ferment since the outgas from the bacteria is co2], and finally non-acidic environment[the lacto bacillus makes it an acidic environment pretty quickly])

there's also two schools of thought to letting it be or pushing down. some people push the ferment down under the brine every day until it gets established and some people let it go until they taste it however long it that takes. the first camp think that by doing that you push any potential contaminants down under the brine where it can't reproduce that well so there is never any big problem. the second camp just take the chance that they were clean enough to not introduce any molds (but there are molds in the air)

the other thing you can do to help is to make your own co2 blanket by mixing baking soda and vinegar and then pouring the co2 over the open jars. Be careful not to splash any of that liquid into your brine though! (similar to how you blow out a candle in science class). I've tried it and it seems to help but i'm not 100% convinced it is required.

Mold spores are in the air, on the food you're fermenting, everywhere. They can get in while you're filling the container. Operating hygienically and producing an environment where they won't thrive (keeping the solids submerged) is good prevention.

You could try something simple like kefir, we did it for our dog mostly. It is very simple. You just strain the yoghurt when it's at your desired thickness, then put fresh milk and the strained grains back in the jar. Over time you'll get too many grains, so you can be the annoying person giving them away and converting people or just feed them to the dog like we did. Optionally, you can do a second ferment in the fridge to let it mature, with optional flavourings. We quickly had too much to use but it works as a substitute for buttermilk and yoghurt in recipes.

I got the original grains from Facebook marketplace or something, we met in a carpark and she sold me a jar for $10 and the whole thing felt a bit like a drug deal. Just like transplanting a plant, you might have middling results until the organisms get used to your way of doing things (your water and room temperature, how long you wait, milk ratio, etc).

Then I forgot about it for a while and it all died but it was very obvious when it "turned", and took a lot longer than expected.

I did kombucha in a 5 gallon bucket with a spigot, and by the time my spouse got tired of the smell in the laundry room / pantry, the scoby was 4" thick. My chickens loved it when i tossed it to them.

I also managed to give some scoby away, to a couple friends and the person who invented the nicotine patch - so that part is also apparently common!

For lacto fermentation: Use a scale to accurately measure ingredients. Use tested recipes. Maintain correct temperature. Learn the signs of a bad ferment (sights and smells). Test the ph of the brine.

Agree, it is fun :-) Kefir is even easier than yogurt once you get the grains.

This place has really exceeded its reputation as bastion of intellect.

This is funny to see, since just yesterday I randomly stumbled upon this HN contribution[0], which discusses an "open sauce" fermented chili sauce[1].

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17540401

[1] https://github.com/aweijnitz/recipe-el_fuego_viviente

I make a lot of fermented food. This guide complicates things a bit. You don't really need an airtight container with a fermentation lock. The easiest thing to do is just keep a layer of brine above the top of whatever you are fermenting. I use mason jars of all sizes and flip the lid over backwards and put the ring on loosely. This allows any gas to escape and keeps contaminants out.

The Noma Guide to Fermentation mentions using a vacuum-sealed plastic bag. I find this much easier to manage. You will only need to "burp" the bag by cutting a corner off, releasing the air then re-sealing.

how do you reseal after you cut off a corner?

An impulse sealer bar, like you'd use to seal the vacuum bag originally.

The vacuum sealer uses heat to seal special bags. You re-seal the same way you seal it originally by placing the part of the bag with a corner cut off in the machine and turning it on. The bag will get a bit smaller each time, but even for long ferments I don't need to do it more than 1 or 2 times. I just make sure to size the bag originally to account for it.

Our vacuum sealer said to never use it on bags with liquids. I'm guessing that's just a stupid compliance rule in case something goes wrong and it sucks the water into the machine.

Can also use a zip lock with water in it, just squeeze air out of the corner.

You can create a lazy pressure release by poking a needle hole in the bag and putting a bit of sellotape over it.

Your method works, but to make it easier to keep the food below the brine, I put a tiny bowl (like you'd use for spices when prepping) inside the mason jar to push things down while still allowing it to bubble. Cover with a piece of cheesecloth and a rubber band.

Food below the brine is key, it will mold otherwise (as I've learned the hard way...).

you can also get glass fermentation weights that are made to fit inside the mouths of mason jars. we've had good luck with those.

other nice simple one is the silicon nipple looking covers. just screw it onto the mason jar and it self burps

Yes for sure, I need to upgrade my system at some point. Another one I've used is a ziplock bag partly filled with water. I don't love the idea of plastic in fermentation, but it has worked in a pinch.

Look at e-jen containers, they're for kimchi normally but I use them for fermenting tons of things. They're great.

I wish that worked for me, I've found there are folds in the bag that seem to be good starting points for mold/infection. Unfortunately I'm not certain what in my process caused this, after a few tests I decided it wasn't for me.

Nipples are dandy, but one overlooked and very simple, effective method is a foodgrade plastic bag (sandwich, ziplock) placed over the mouth of the jar and held on with a rubber band. The flexibility of the rubber band allows gas to escape and if paranoid about the top layer, a leaf or more of cabbage (or something else) can help press the desirable layer beneath the brine. I've found that after 10-14 days the leaves become unappealing but do not affect anything beneath. Note: I ferment in Florida, with the AC rarely below 80f unless such occurs naturally. I have learned to increase the salt and decrease the time when the temp is above 77f.

Plastics do release (toxic?) subtances over time, especially in an acidic liquid.

I don't think he's describing the plastic being in the liquid, just acting as a form of lid that can release pressure.

A slightly different beginner lacto ferment is turnip + beetroot "pickle". 9 parts turnips, 1 part beetroot, 2% salt of combined turnip + beetroot + water, all by weight.

Super tasty, not spicy, can be done in 5 days, fermentation kicks off quickly due to sugar content in beets so you get quick feedback.

Fermentation shepherd here. I fusion India's and America's spicy tradition with my alioli-romesco-paella EU background. Thus a suggestion for the article: Add curcuma with the cumin, and ginger and cardamom with the garlic.

My latest work is habanero-arbol-carrot-cauliflower pickle with a complex spice mix, smashed and fermented two more days. Somehow carrot & chili fermented sauces make us happy ;)

Curcuma is turmeric, yes?

Exactly, online you can find dry root chips or cut the dry roots into chips, then smash them with the coffee grinder, it will taste 10x better.

I find carrot based fermented sauces very versatile as well. Yum.

Sauces are hard to get right in small batches. A good demonstration for me was Epicurious YouTube series on 'expert guesses cheap vs expensive' for various foods. The one for hot sauce [0] is basically the only one in this series where the 'expert' often preferred cheaper items to the more expensive - basically as some of the small batch ones werent as carefully flavor balanced

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dVRl8VzQMQM&t=1

Just wanted to add this anecdote in case people want to get frisky with fermented hot sauces. I’ve been experimenting with fermented hot-sauce equivalents of Indian pickles, using green mango, dried lemon, turmeric, fenugreek, nigella, mustard, etc (not all in the same sauce) and it’s shockingly similar in taste to the original pickle but without any oil.

Made some last year using fresno chilis, garlic and onions. It came out great but had a tendency to go right through me. I threw some in a pot and boiled it briefly and now it doesn't cause any issues. I'm guessing the fermentation bacteria were warring with my natural flora. Anyway, try this if you have similar issues.

Do onions or garlic otherwise cause you issues? I recently discovered that one or the other tend to "go right through" as you say. I used to assume it was the grease used at certain restaurants or when i cooked at home and could never figure it out, but someone said that it's possible for onions and / or garlic to do it as you get older, especially if you've had your gut biome wrecked by anti-biotics.

I definitely have reduced my intake since i found that out, and it helps. and when i say "right through" i mean within 5 minutes of finishing a meal.

Nope, my wife and I eat over a full head of garlic in many dishes. I've heard some folks have issues due to SIBO or something though.

Google FODMAP - I presume you have heard of it but it could be related to your onion sensitivity and will help self-diagnose other irritants.

I just finished a batch that's been fermenting for 6 months. I make mine with Turmeric, salt and chili. I finished with vinegar to stop the ferment and add some more tanginess. Made about 24 bottles. Im thinking of adding some charred wood like oak, cherry or apple tree next time to give some additional flavour.

i have six different kinds of chilis fermenting right now. it's a lot of fun and the results can be spectacular. also you can put a bit of dried chilis in there to add a bunch of lovely smokiness.

i do lactofermentation in a vacuum bag. it works very well, just need to put a pinhole in it before it explodes.

Question for fermentation hot sauce aficionados: my Anaheim peppers are doing great in my garden and I have far more than I know what to do with; Anaheim are pretty mild, so are they even worth making a hot sauce out of?

I'd say so if you could figure what you wanted to put it on. It would be sweet and sour instead of spicy. I bet it would be good on meatloaf. Maybe you want to slice them up and just have them as pickled peppers. You could also make pepper ketchup or relish.

It's always fun to mix peppers when fermenting. Could add a couple habaneros if you wanted heat! I also sometimes char half of them to get a smoky flavor. Just make sure some are raw so that it ferments.

If it's the flavor you like, and just want to add heat, you can augment the heat with a high scoville neutral chili. I've done this before by adding habanero or high scoville cayenne after the ferment is several days in.

You can still ferment them to preserve. Will make a sweeter sauce that would still make a nice condiment.

kombucha is also REALLY good and pretty easy! and once you scale up a little bit you can have basically as much kombucha as you want for mere pennies. way better than the $/bottle at the grocery store or costco.

Second this. I'm a fairly experienced cook and I was surprised at how easy it was to make kombucha using a bottle of organic kombucha to grow a SCOBY. /r/kombucha has some good starter recipes.

The only important thing I can think of is to be scrupulously clean.

Growing up and till today, we ferment our excess vegetables.

I will have to try hot peppers as I have never done them.

We use a small piece of home made bread on the bottom of the primary jar. It works every time.

Wow, this is cool to hear. Do you use any vegetables at all? Is there a particular flavor you are going for or just anything goes?

Do you leave it chunky like a Kimchi? Do you make a sauce out of it? What do you serve it with? Do you put the veg in a salt water brine or just pile it in the jar with the bread?

> Do you use any vegetables at all?

I must not have made myself clear. We put a piece of bread at the bottom of a large glass jar, added what we wanted to ferment on top, added seasoning, pour salty brine on top (this depends on the plant). The only thing I try to make sure is that everything is covered with the liquid. Finally, put the jar out onto a sunny spot.

I tend to mix the vegetables, and although evenly cut, leave them larger if possible. I can always blend them down before use.

As for the salt brine - the salt does not have to come from direct salt. I have used salted & dried fish, some existing high salt sauces, and similar. Also, I have done where I dry salt the vegetable, wait till some of the liquid is pulled out then just put it the jar, and pour regular water over it.

The bread gives a kick start with fermentation. You could also just keep the brine liquid left-over from an emptied jar and pour it into the next batch.

I ferment cucumbers, tomatoes, cauliflower, onions, carrots, asparagus, corn, bean sprouts, green beans, shelled beans of all kinds, cabbage of all types, garlic, beats, potatoes, radishes, olives.

Really, I cannot think anything edible plant that cannot be fermented. I fermented nettle and turned out okay.

Caveat emptor - I am making this for myself and my family. We eat this stuff all the time. Check and double check. I do not want to hear you blaming me for having magic moments in the WC after eating your ferment!

This is obviously a well-researched and well written article, but I do disagree with one of the food safety recommendations the author makes. About mold, they say "Mold is another issue. If you see green, blue, black, or orange mold growing on the surface of your ferment, you don’t always have to throw it out. Just scrape it off if the growth isn’t extensive." This may seem like reasonable advice, but in fact the visible mold is merely the fruiting body. The roots (I believe they're called mycelium) of the mold grow down into the substrate (in this case your hot sauce). I can't speak to the health effects of consuming the mycelium vs the fruiting bodies, but it's not sufficient to just scrape off the surface.

mold is bacteria not fungi

No, mold is fungi. Some of them even contain anti-bacteria properties (penicillin).

I’m curious if you’re just misremembering or if there’s some particular reason you say that.

Every ferment has some level of mold in it, though. As do most air cured meats.

If you consider yeast a type of mold then sure

It depends on the texture and density of the fermenting food/substrate. In some cases such as hard cheeses the mycelium doesn't penetrate very deep which means the mold part can be cut off and the rest is still reasonably safe to eat for anyone who isn't immuno-compromised.

Although generally if there's unintended mold on home made fermented foods it means something went wrong in one of the preparation steps e.g. acidity too low, moisture too high, something was exposed to air instead of submersed in brine. Many Chinese language Youtube tutorials on fermented chili sauce also suggest thoroughly wiping the inside of the container with high ABV spirits before adding the mixture.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com