Comment by mindcrime | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mindcrime | Hacker News Reader

Most hot-sauce (especially the hotter kinds) don't taste good at all. I attribute that to the heavy use of Habanero pepper, which is pretty damn hot, but Habaneros don't actually taste very good.

I've discovered a nice combination, however, that can be both hotter and taste better. Scotch Bonnet peppers[1] are widely used in the Caribbean Islands, and are almost, but not quite, as hot as as Habaneros, but they taste MUCH better. OTOH, Naga Jolokia "Ghost Pepper" peppers[2] are much hotter than Habaneros, and taste, well... not any worse than Habaneros, at worst. So, if you want to jazz something up to nuclear hot levels and keep it tasting good, load it down with Scotch Bonnet and then add just a few drips of Naga Jolokia pepper sauce.

This has become my "go to" combination for making really hot tex-mex type dishes, curries, etc. Yumm....

FWIW, my favorite brand for both (at least partly because it's available retail locally) is the "Tropical Pepper Co. brand)[3][4].

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scotch_bonnet_%28pepper%29

[2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naga_Bhut_Jolokia

[3]: http://tropicalpepper.com/product.asp?idProduct=94

[4]: http://tropicalpepper.com/product.asp?idProduct=135

I grew some wonderful Habaneros last summer. It was a variety from Seed Savers Exchanged called Mustard Habanero. Hotter than hell, but the split second before the heat kicked in, you were treated to the most wonderful, smokey pepper flavor. Needless to say, they made a great hot sauce. I fermented them in salt water innoculated with some leftover brine from homemade kimchi. It was a great condiment!

It's a very small minority of hot sauces that use habaneros.

The idea of ranking chiles on a scale of bad to good I find completely foreign. Like people, each one has its own character and something to appreciate. And that appreciation can scarcely be found in bottled hot sauces.

(I live in Mexico and I'm here for the food. Indeed I doubt I would be here were it not for the existence of chiles and the myriad ways in which they're exploited in Mexican cuisine.)

I think habanero peppers have a great flavor, but the heat usually overpowers them. Removing the seeds and gills, and adding vinegar and/or carrots can tame the heat.

Habaneros were a staple for me, up until I discovered Scotch Bonnets. And then Harris Teeter started carrying a good bottled Naga Jolokia sauce, so now I rarely have a use for habaneros. To be fair though, the flavor does vary quite a bit from batch to batch. But I've come to the conclusion that, relatively speaking, habanero peppers are pretty bad from a flavor standpoint.

Taste is, of course, pretty subjective, so I make no claim that my position is objectively correct!

You'd probably really enjoy Secret Aardvark, then: http://www.secretaardvark.com/

Reasonable heat level, really good flavor. They're not kidding when they say "dump on everything". Not the kind of hot sauce where you put a few drops for heat; this is the kind you can use several tablespoons of at a sitting.

> Scotch Bonnet peppers [...] are almost, but not quite, as hot as as Habaneros, but they taste MUCH better.

I'd been disappointed about the fact that habaneros are hard to find in London, whereas Scotch bonnets are everywhere. Perhaps I shouldn't be, then.

My local supermarket sometimes has Dorset naga peppers in stock. They're supposed to be a very hot cultivar of the jolokia, but none of the ones I've bought have actually been all that hot.

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