Caribbean Red Sauce

A.K.A. "CHEMICAL X"

OK, this isnt anything particularly special. Its simple and easy to make.

It doesnt require any painstaking bottling procedures and keeps for a very

long time. Oh, and its good and hot too! Not quite as hot as Narly Morich

but still extremely hot by most peoples standards.

This recipe produces a gallon of sauce. If you want less, just cut it in half or quarters or whatever works for you.

Hope this helps someone :-)

STEP ONE
Start out by thoroughly washing the peppers.

I dont use chemicals on my plants, but there could certainly be

some dirt, and my doctor told me to cut down on dirt :-)

For this recipe I use Caribbean Red Habanero's

I measure mine with a pint sized container they

use to keep peppers in at the grocery store.

You need 6 pints of whole peppers packed very tightly.

STEP TWO
Dry the peppers and step back and admire those

beautiful, hot little bastards!

I just drain them on a paper towel

Here they are dry. No reason not to admire them again

for a minute or two before moving on :)

STEP THREE
Admire all your cool stuff

6 pints peppers tightly packed. This works out to around 90-100 peppers depending on the size.

2 quarts white vinegar

1 1/2 heads fresh garlic (8 - 10 cloves)

1 cup carrots

2 medium Vidalia onions

1 1/2 20 oz can of pineapple in juice (not syrup)

STEP FOUR


Remove all the stems.

If you leave them in they will taste like shit :-)

I suppose if you are into that you can leave them in

but I prefer to take them out.

STEP FIVE


Cut each pepper in half.

This reduces the amount of time it takes to cook the

peppers. Some pansies...er...folks like to wear rubber

gloves when they do this but I dont. Capsaicin doesn't

bother my hands. Just make sure that you wash thoroughly

before you touch anything important. If you do forget

and scratch your eye or something down lower, thats a

mistake you will only ever make once :-)

STEP SIX


Rough chop everything else up and toss it in the pot.

When you add the pineapple, make sure to add the juice as well.

No need to go crazy chopping things up really small.

Cook the carrots in the microwave for about 3 minutes

before adding them to the pot. Carrots take a long

time to cook and if you cooked them all the way in

the pot with the rest everything else would be overcooked.

Admire the mix of colors and textures.

I do a lot of admiring, dont I?

STEP SEVEN
Take a minute to marvel at your 12 cup Kitchen Aid

food processor. This was a nice addition to your kitchen

and should be properly appreciated!

You may need to puree smaller batches if you have a smaller

food processor. Too bad. I bet you are not as happy as I am.

If you do this, as I had to last year, make sure you mix

everything back together in the end because the balance of

ingredients will probably not be the same from batch to batch

and you want your sauce to be consistent.

STEP EIGHT


Simmer the whole mess on medium/high heat stirring

frequently. Cook only until the peppers begin to get

soft. No longer than that. Well, I guess you can cook

the crap out of it if you like. Its your sauce. :-)

Make sure that you stick your face right in the pot

while its simmering and take a nice deep breath.

When you are finished choking and coughing, throw it all

into the food processor (liquid and all) and admire it.

As you can see, the ingredients are cooked, but still retain most of their firmness and

texture. Not that those qualities matter once its pureed, but most importantly, they

retain their flavor. Overcooking ruins it in my opinion.

STEP NINE
Puree it in the food processor until its smooth.

I add a little bit of the vinegar at this step.

Just enough to help liquefy the ingredients.

Possibly 1/2 to 3/4 of a cup. I add this gradually

while its being processed through the little spout

at the top. This drizzles it in gradually while

all the ingredients are whizzing around at amazing speed.

STEP TEN
As you can see, its been thoroughly pureed

into a fairly thick liquid. This is pretty much

finished now with the exception of the vinegar.

You should have at this point the better part

of 2 quarts of white vinegar. Just add this in

in a container large enough to accommodate the

whole batch and mix thoroughly.

STEP ELEVEN


I like to mix it all up in a 1 gallon jug and then

pour some of it into a 1/2 gallon pitcher with a spout,

that way I can easily pour it into bottles. Make sure

you mix thoroughly immediately before each pour.

This sauce will separate and if you dont mix it thoroughly

before every pour you might end up with inconsistent

heat and flavor in different containers.

Make sure to shake it up before you use it too.

I'm sure you noticed that you didn't add any emulsifiers

so the sauce will separate when it sits.

STEP TWELVE
Once its all mixed you can then transfer it

into whatever container you want to store it in.

Being a practical type, I usually just put it back into the

vinegar bottles. If you have quart sized bottles, you will need about 3. I know, you only have

2 quarts of vinegar. Did you think the rest of the ingredients had no volume? If you stuck with

the recipe, this sauce has a pH of 3.4 so it will keep well for a very long time and needs no

preservatives. I keep it refrigerated, but this isn't really necessary. Still, it makes me feel

better.

STEP THIRTEEN
The final (and most important to some folks) step is to clean up the huge mess you made.

You have lots of things covered in an orange substance that can cause lots of pain and

suffering to the unsuspecting or uninitiated. Be kind to them.

The job is not finished until you have cleaned all your tools and put them away, making extra

sure that you didnt leave some item covered with capsaicin for some unsuspecting person to

come along and burn the crap out of their eyes with.

My wife has been through this enough times to know better. Now she just harasses me until I finish

the job.