Which hot sauce do you use for cooking?

[fishnfla]

(verses a straight shot on a clam or oyster)

I like Chrystal. Tabasco has too much edge, harsh on this old stomach.

[bearfan454]

1. Crystal's okay.

Sometimes I put some habanero sauce with it if I want it for wings.

[fishnfla]

2. I was just looking at the label here Bearfan

they have an offer for a recipe booklet-2 bucks and the receipt of purchase of 2 crystal products

might check 'em out, from new orleans

[Mandate My Ass]

3. Tapatio - found in the Latino section of the grocery store

I also like Lizano, which I tried in Costa Rica and had enough foresight to bring several bottles home, but that's long gone.

American-made hot sauces taste too vinegary to me since I've tasted the stuff made in Mexico and Central Am.

[tishaLA]

5. Tapatio is my choice too

I wish I knew what my local Thai place uses, though. It's GREAT! Even better than tapatio, if that's possible.

[merci_me]

4. I use a Vietnamese chili sauce

It's called Tuong Ot Sriracha and it's HOT!! A little goes a long way (for me). I make a great Hunan eggplant using the chili sauce. My husband eats it straight, lol I have to have a side of creamy cottage cheese to cool my tongue so I can still taste the eggplant.

Twenty years ago, I use to have to go to a Vietnamese market to get it, but now it's everywhere (at least in this part of Houston). I can get it at Randalls(Safeway), H-E-B or Krogers. They all stock it with all the other chili sauces, rather than the Asian foods, though it may be there, too.

Here's a link where you can see the bottle. You'll probably recognize it.
http://www.sweatnspice.com/proddetail.php?prod=363

Mary

[Stinky The Clown]

6. We use several different kinds

We use several, depending on what's cooking. For general table use and for anything Sparkly's gonna be eatin' we use the pride of New Iberia, Loozyanna, the original Tobasco. I like the flavor (apart from the hot). I've many similar ones but come back to this.



Of about similar hotness is this one. As I type this, I'm not sure if it is Vietnamese or Thai. It is sweeter than the Tabasco and has a nice flavor. I get it at the Asian store, where there's a dizzying array of similar products (some of which look pretty scary to my untrained eye).



When we want very hot (my sons and I eat this, Sparkly and Sparkly Jr won't go near it) we use Peppa-Po, which is essentially pickled crushed Scotch Bonnets. We often add this to Pad Thai. It is essentially quite sweet once you get past the hot and seems to go very, very well with the lime and chopped peanuts we put on our Pad Thai.



This is the coup de grace ..... a concentrated capsicum concoction that is hotter than any natural sauce. It says on the label to use caution, but that may well be marketing hype. But it is hot!



There used to a stall in one of the local marketplaces that sold only hot sauces. They had one special type that was sold in a sealed clear cylinder. Inside that was this jar that looked more like a chemical jar than a hot sauce jar. It was super concentrated capsicum at the top of the "hot" scale (there is such a scale, but the name escapes me at the moment). The instructions said to add only a few drops to a gallon of whatever it is you're adding it to! It also had the universal poison sign, the skull and crossbones, on the jar. I asked the clerk if this was hype (it was an otherwise very "anti hype/anti marketing" type label) and he said no. If eaten by itself it could literally be toxic.

I left that on the shelf.

[ernstbass]

7. I use Chalula

but my chef brother uses a Thai sauce that is awesome (can't recall the name of it)