Alright, Alright! It has been some time since I have posted a new recipe, and this one is a bit special, since you've all been part of it since I began the soak! To that end, it was only supposed to be a 3-month soak, but in all honesty, I had a couple other cooks come up and I simply forgot about this one - lucky I caught it when I did, and you'll see why. I have created the timeline from initial soak, to remembering it was even a soak, to determining viability, draining, mash, cook, sampling, and bottling.
The first two photos show you the potential for a build-up of what's called 'Kahm's yeast.' This is a naturally occurring entity especially in the lactoferment world, but is typically controlled through sanitization and salination in an air-locked environment, but is not at all a guarantee there won't be a build-up - it is not inherently dangerous. This is one of the more advanced states I have had and have had the build-up ruin the ferment; this can happen if left unchecked and unchallenged. It's off-putting to see but the soak could be totally salvageable. What I did is first pop the top and smell it. The odor was exactly that of a hot pepper ferment, mixed with notes of 'doughiness' or a bread-like back, but not sourdough... just a 'bread quality. I was satisfied that the soak was at least viable enough to try and save, which is what you see in photo's 3 and 4.
I used a spoon to take most of the surface yeast off, and a papertowel to get the sides - a few times. What you're seeing post-skim is a half a pepper and you may see some 'spots,' those are actual chile oil beads - I tried to save as many as I could. From this point, to determine further viability, I grabbed a spoon and tasted the brine. It was really good - hot, a bit sour (as it's supposed to be), slight breadiness, but nothing that made me fearful or question the integrity of the soak. So, into the sieve as in photo 5.
In photo 6, you see the yield added to my blender - I had to do two batches. To the ferment, I added back about 1/3 of the brine and let it go on high for as few mins, results seen in photo 7. I added the mash to a large mixing bowl as I finished the second batch. The colors and flavors are not where I wanted them by this stage, so I added 2-pounds of cherries (we pitted and vacuum sealed in last summer) and two-handfuls of cranberries (we vacuum packed these around Thanksgiving, I also added about a 1/4 cup of pure cherry syrup (no sugar added no preservatives) and added everything to a big stainless steel pot, as seen in photo 8. I also added a decent pop of sea salt (about 1/4 cup) and about 1 cup White vinegar. Let it comes up very slowly (med-low heat) just until I could see a few bubbles break, then I broke out the boat motor for a better mix and finer product. Turned down the heat to low and popped a lid on it, then proceeded to the other big-ass pot on the stove that had my bottles in it.
If I am keeping the sauce all for myself, I don't typically cook it as this will kill the good bacteria, but the process does sweeten the peppers, so I think it's really up to you how you wanna go - it's really all a matter of pH and shelf-stability (and is a reason I have mostly switched to amber glass - to avoid my sauces becoming 'lightstruck')
While the sauce is cooking, photo 9 shows my bottles after sanitization - hard boiled for 10 mins, then drain. I only use a cheap bottle drainer that struggles with the larger 16oz bottles (the amber ones), so I will break up the effort when needed.
What's left for a gourmet small-batch sauce-maker to do? TASTE IT! Photos 10 and 11 show exactly that - 10 shows a generous ladle of fresh sauce on a bowl of wings I just pulled from the oven (also made from scratch - the wings not the oven); 11 shows the wings after a mix demonstrating coatability. Fucking hot. This sauce has a straight-on POP of sweetness as to begin to eat it - not sweet as in sugary, but sweet as in a perfect bite of fruit (FYSA - no sugar is added outside of what naturally occurs in the foods used). The sweet lasts a couple seconds then it's the hotness of a mixbag of superhot chocolate pods - reapers, ghosts, scoprions, 7-pots, and habanero. I will admit, I had another bowl after, and I was sweatin', the top of my head looked like the skin of a tent in a rainstorm.
Photo 12 shows the pH after the cook, though admittedly, I forgot before bottling and had to do it after - I admit I was nervous as it took my meter about 3-minutes to finally drop below 4.0 (4.6 is the very tip-top level of being okay - under 4.0 is best for stability, and below 3.6 is my goal every time - this takes us down the rabbithole of pH vs canning).
Time for bottling and finishing. Photo 13 shows my filling process - these are the bottles that have cooled after sanitization. I must preface this step with this: I get my sauce to about 185F and hold that consistently as I fill (a lid will be necessary to avoid condensing the sauce). Once one bottle is filled, I immediately cap it and turn it upside down - this accomplished 2 things: first, the hot contact sanitizes the lid from inside, and second, as the bottle cools, it creates a vacuum, essentially 'canning' the bottle - this is known as 'hot packing' yeah, the term sounds faggy but there is no fuckery going on here. Photo 14 shows my high-speed scientific method for hot-pack finishing.
Finally, photo 15 shows the yield. 4 16oz bottles, 2 5oz, woozey bottles, and 2 4oz boston bottles. The locklid (abount 8oz) is what was left so we are currently working on this one. We have enjoyed it on eggs, BBQ chicked, pork chops - it is thus far, one of the best sauces we have made and its uses keeps growing. Now is has cooled well, so its consistency is analogous to a thinned gochujang, similar profile as well, but ours is better in every way.
At this point, we are not certain what is bringing the sweetness - the only things I have done diffrently this time are the cranberries and the parsnips. I have another soak up for processing that includes parsnips so I will see if I can recreate it. Either way, this is the most addictive sauce we have made to date.
I am really not certain where to judge the SHU at for this one, I enjoy so much hot that I am biased, so I will be critical and call it at least 400K SHU, and maybe up to 700K
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