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¡Caliente!

June 16, 2010 4 Comments Filed Under: Uncategorized

Think here I have some chipotles, some anchos, some nyoras, guindillas, chorizeros…

The lack of decent salsa and hot sauce in this country led me to emptying local sauces into plastic water bottles (during my trip to Mexico and Guatemala in 2008) and bringing them back in my suitcase. I’ve been eking them out while searching for adequate brands available in the UK. 

None of the fresh salsas sold in the shops, even the organic stores, are any good; too sweet, no lime, no fresh coriander. They are more like cold tomato sauce for pasta.
I still haven’t found a chili sauce worthy of it’s name. I tried Cool Chilli Co. chipotle ketchup (smoked dried jalapeno peppers): too sweet, like chilli jam. A’wing’ sauce I bought at last year’s Taste of London festival was not too bad, using habaneros.
I’m on a constant quest for hot sauce: from the States I bought a popular brand ‘Emeril’s ‘kick it up’ Green Pepper sauce’ made from Jalapenos. I particularly like green chili sauce but it’s hard to get a good one. I once found a fantastic specimen in a local Indian shop, but two weeks later, having eaten it on every meal, even on toast in the morning, they then stopped stocking it. I didn’t even note down the name!
Green Tabasco is great but has little body, while Wahaca’s Habanero sauce is just too hard core for me.  Freshly made ‘harissa’ bats shop-bought off the field, sambal oelek and Piri Piri have their own qualities. I have hot sauce friendships, where we compare the different tastes, exchange bottles and discuss the slightly uncomfortable end journey of chilli sauce through our bodies. It’s an addiction that releases endorphins: no pain, no gain.
A good sauce is not too hot, not too mild, has a fruity vinegary quality and if using chipotles, a profound smokiness. 
I imagine most kitchens have a mystery jar or a hanging garland of dried red chilli’s thick with dust, lurking about. 
Of late I’ve been experimenting with the paprika-like Nyoras (or ñoras), a non-spicy red pepper from Spain, used by Rachel McCormack of Catalan Cooking to make romesco sauce. I’ve also used guindillas (a little spicy) and chorizeros (deep and earthy), both available from Brindisa.
I’m hoping Thomasina Miers will give food bloggers a chilli workshop so we can discover more about each type. Her wonderful book ‘Mexican Food made simple’ sets out a few chillis commonly used in Mexican cooking: Chile de arbol, very hot and similar to Pepperoncino, Serrano, with a “fresh, grassy, hot flavour”; jalapenos or the smoked dried version ‘chipotles’, mild; poblanos or their dried cousins ‘Anchos’, mild, similar to Spanish dried peppers; habanero or scotch bonnets, the hottest. 
Botanically chillis are berries, but for culinary purposes are either vegetables (bell peppers) or spices. I think it’s important to get the right one; tiny birds eye chillis, for instance, are perfect for Thai food. 
So, having run out, I’ve simply had to make my own:
Some mystery dried chillis, soaked in 500ml hot water, deseeded and de stemmed. Keep the water.
50g brown sugar
1 tblspn of Ground cumin
1 tblspn of Ground coriander
6 or 7 tomatoes
100ml of either cider vinegar or red wine vinegar
Salt
Boil the lot together. whizz up in the food processor. Strain into a bowl. Bottle.
Really this should be bottled in an old Coca cola bottle with a hole speared in the metal cap…

Use on huevos rancheros on a sunny Sunday morning…

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Comments

  1. Barbara

    June 16, 2010 at 5:32 pm

    I'm dying for some huevos rancheros now…:) I love hot sauces and chili sauces and look for new everywhere I go. I am really fond of one popularly called rooster sauce because it has a rooster on the bottle and nobody can say sriruacha, which is the real name.

    Reply
  2. James

    June 16, 2010 at 8:16 pm

    but making your own is always better. Even better when you grow the chillis….

    Reply
  3. theundergroundrestaurant

    June 17, 2010 at 9:53 pm

    Do you grow your chillis James?

    Reply
  4. Helen

    June 19, 2010 at 9:21 am

    As you know I am also loving the chipotles at the moment. I was thinking the very same about using the sauce with huevo rancheros. Begging for it, basically. Looks gorgeous.

    Reply

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MsMarmiteLover aka Kerstin Rodgers.

Chef, photographer, author, journalist, blogger. Pioneer of the supperclub movement.

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msmarmitelover

Kerstin Rodgers/MsMarmiteLover
Apple rose blossom tarts with rose jam. Rose Appl Apple rose blossom tarts with rose jam.  Rose Apple Blossom Tarts

Serves 8

Equipment: 
Microwave
Cupcake or muffin tin

I use a red-skinned apple to make these, to get a hint of blush at the edges of the ‘petals’.

Ingredients:
4 Pink Lady or Royal Gala apples, cored, cut into quarters, sliced thinly into half moons
1 lemon, squeezed
1 pack all butter readymade puff pastry 320g, on a roll, cut into 8 strips about 6 cms long
100g of melted butter
1/2 jar of rose jam
1 or 2 tbsp cinnamon or cardamom, ground 
Pinch maldon salt
2 or 3 tbsp icing sugar

Instructions

Prepare a bowl of acidulated water (cold water with lemon juice) to prevent browning.
Core the apples, and cut them in quarters. Slice thinly into half-moons (a mandolin is useful for this). 
Put them into a large bowl of cold water with the lemon.
Microwave the bowl of sliced apples for 5 minutes until soft enough to bend slightly but not cook them.
Preheat the oven to 180ºC.
Roll out the puff pastry. Divide into 8 sections by cutting the roll into quarters then halving each quarter. You will end up with 8 approximately 6cm strips.
Brush the strip with melted butter then paint with a layer of rose jam. You can then dust with either ground cinnamon or cardamom.
Lay the apple slices along the top of the pastry strip, overlapping them. Fold up the bottom half of the pastry strip to make an pleat with the skin side of the apple half moon poking over the top.
Roll up the folded pastry strips until they look like a rose made of apple at the top
Place ‘rose’ side up, in a buttered cupcake tin
Repeat until all are done and bake for 20 -30 minutes.
Using a tea strainer or small sieve, sprinkle with icing sugar.
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