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Comment by cshimmin | Hacker News Reader

Have you ever made “hot” sauce with bell peppers? My wife has literally zero tolerance for spicy food, wondering if I could make some kind of capsaicin-free sauce that gives some of the flavor of eg sriracha or tapatio, etc.

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A mild tomatillo sauce (“green sauce”) is what you should look into. Try some commercial stuff (which is generally medium heat) to see what range of flavors is achievable.

Note that when self made it can be accidentally end up with too much “vegetal” taste to it. It’s been a very long time since I’ve made it so I forgot what my resulting recipe was that addressed that.

You can look into ajvar, a Serbian sauce with grilled peppers and eggplant. You can make it as spicy as you want by adding hot peppers if you want.

Is known in a wider area eg. ajver in Turkey. It's okay, the texture can be a bit glooey sometimes. (Sidenote: in Turkish they have different words for heat from temperature and heat from hot peppers - anyone chip in here?)

On heat tolerance, do some genetic thing where people get one, two or three receptors[1] which give different sensitivity to different people. I had a GF who would struggle with the level of capsaicin I literally wouldn't even notice. I knew a guy who would snack on scotch bonnet peppers straight, which would be impossibly agonising for me.

[1] from memory, doubtless incorrect as well

Turkish word for heat when related to temperature is "sıcak", when related to peppers is "acı".

But "acı" can also mean bitter. You have to look at the context to understand. However things can both be spicy and bitter. In that case it gets complicated :)

English has hot, spicy and piquant.

The problem is all of those can be ambiguous. "Hot" can mean high temperature, "spicy" can mean e.g. lots of garlic or cumin, or any other spices, and "piquant" can mean tart like citrus.

Perhaps the lack of a dedicated mapping to "capsaicin sensation" stems historically from England's reputedly bland cuisine...

The Turkish word is also ambiguous. Chili peppers were only brought from South America in the 16th century.

England's bland food is a relatively recent development, much more recent than the language.

https://edmundstanding.wordpress.com/2020/05/28/hot-peppers-...

>England's reputedly bland cuisine...

Thank goodness for immigration.

Okay, in light of recent UK events I get the subtext :-)

But I don't think it's fair to call UK food bland. Done properly it's very good, but what it's not (usually) is heavily seasoned. In no way does that require it to be tasteless, and done properly it isn't.

My understanding is that UK food was on a par with other European countries in medieval times. By the 1950s to 1970s, it was pretty bad though. No doubt some of this was down to wartime rationing. Perhaps some of it was due to protestant fear of anything too enjoyable.

There is a reason there are thousands of Indian restuarants in England and approximately zero English restaurants in India. ;0)

Thankfully, food has improved vastly in the UK since the 70s.

peppers are a fruit and there are a ton of varieties that add slightly different flavors, ranging from vegetable, chocolate, peach, pineapple, etc - you just need a good combination of peppers that work well together, they don't have to be spicy.

personally, I'd add a little more than bell peppers, which tend to have a more vegetable flavor. there are some Italian peppers that have a nice sweetness without heat, for instance.

if you're looking for more of a sriracha flavor, add some garlic in there! there's just as much of a world of peppers to explore that isn't burning hot as there is super hot varieties.

Yes, generally. It won't have the flavor of either of those, but you will be able to adjust that with with flavors that don't impart heat. For something like tapatio, probably garlic, cumin, and a more neutral vinegar like a greek white wine vinegar. Maybe even bay leaf. Stick with green bell peppers, because riper ones are going to be much fruitier.

Also, check out Habanada peppers.

You could try the Hot Ones Jr. line:

https://heatonist.com/collections/hot-ones-jr-hot-sauces

A “super mild” line of sauces to introduce kids to hot sauce without overwhelming them. They might be a good starting point to see if she likes it.

The better bet would be to use green tomatillos instead of peppers as the main flavor.

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