As the American diet becomes more health conscious, some of the healthy food choices need to be spiced up with hot sauce. Hot condiments are flooding the market and exploding into gourmet stores carrying exotic and private label hot sauces. If you want to ride the hot sauce wave, you need to have some background first, and the best way to get it is by partaking in some hot sauce education and training.
With the hot pepper sauce market growing, hot sauce manufacturers are jumping over each other with claims that their sauce is the spiciest, most daring and best tasting. Before you stock your shelves with the first hot sauce you find, make sure you have a good basis for what you are tasting and how it got to taste like that by doing the following:
1. Educate yourself on hot sauce manufacturing
2. Locate hot sauce distributors that can recommend products
3. Research hot sauce recipes for key ingredients
Action Steps
The best contacts and resources to help you get it done
Learn how the hot sauce gets its start
To fully understand how hot sauce gets its heat or kick, you should familiarize yourself with how it's made. Different ingredients can make the sauce thicker or thinner, and the heat of the specific pepper, which is measured by the Scoville scale, is responsible for the tongue burning, eye watering sensations.
I recommend: There is a comprehensive guide to the manufacturing steps involved in making hot sauce by
Sunbelt Shows at Fiery-Foods.com. The
NMSU: The Chile Pepper Institute provides guides on growing chilis, how chilis are processed, what diseases they are susceptible to, common terminology and an entire section detailing the heat of chilis.
Find a distributor to help you select hot sauce products
If your knowledge is still low, rely on a professional to guide and educate you. Hot sauce distributors are familiar with the brands and types of hot sauces that are on the market. They can help you learn about the different varieties of hot sauce before you spend money purchasing brands that won't sell well.
I recommend: The folks at
Hot Shots, who are also hot sauce wholesalers, are available to help you via email, live chat, phone or fax to get you setup with your hot sauces. The team at
Innuendo Enterprises will spend time consulting with you to help you start up your hot sauce business or private label hot sauce.
Educate yourself on hot sauce recipes
People are particular about their hot sauce. Some people even travel with hot sauce in their purses or pockets when going out to eat. The best way to learn what brands are popular and have the special place of being brought along with people, is to checkout some recipes. Hot sauce recipes are available online, but for the more daring, why not check out a hot sauce competition to learn the tricks of the trade.
I recommend: HotSauceAddicts.com has recipes by type of pepper. They also have tips on drying peppers, sterilizing hot sauce bottles and other information on planting, growing, harvesting and using hot peppers.
Stovall's Gifts has the latest information on upcoming hot sauce contests.
Tips & Tactics
Helpful advice for making the most of this Guide
- Stock your shelves or establishment with a variety of hot sauce brands that range from mild to the hottest hot sauce you can find. You want to be able to provide a hot sauce that will please even the most timid of tongues.
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