How to Make Your Own Tabasco Sauce

Sometimes you can stumble onto something on the internet that truly satisfies one of your fantasies in life.

How 'bout a recipe to make your own Tabasco Sauce?

This post comes courtesy of The Simple Dollar, which is a personal finance blog with some other subjects--including food and cooking--mixed in. Be sure to take a look at his exceptional series on Building a Better Blog.

And of course when my favorite non-alcoholic beverage comes up, it draws my attention. Here are the instructions:

Tabasco sauce
Grow two hot pepper plants in a pot on your windowsill (I use dirt from the yard, a coffee can, and my own seeds). I like to use red tabasco chiles, but most small, hot, red chile peppers can be used. Harvest all of the peppers from them, chop them up, and weigh them. For each pound you have, add two cups of distilled white vinegar (had for pennies at the store) and two teaspoons of salt. Put it over heat until it’s about to boil, then let it simmer for five minutes. Dump the mix in a blender, puree, then put in a glass jar and sit it in the fridge to season for about two weeks. For about $0.25, you have enough Tabasco sauce to fill four or five of those little Tabasco bottles. Once it’s steeped, I usually put it in a number of small baggies and freeze it, then refill small bottles when needed.


Note that this post also contains a recipe for homemade BBQ sauce and a "recipe" for a Crisco-based chapstick and handcream.

I think I might take a pass on trying those last two.

Related Posts:
How to Make a Mole Sauce: Intense, Exotic and Surprisingly Easy to Make
Braised Pork in Guajillo Chile Sauce
Cajun Meatloaf
The History of Tabasco

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8 comments:

Anonymous said...

I suggest wearing rubber/plastic gloves while cutting, etc red peppers. Also, do not wipe your eyes while wearing the gloves!! Lesson from past experience.
Phyllis

Daniel said...

Agreed, and I'd add for the hombres out there, use particular care if by chance you need to pee after working with these peppers. Great irritation can result.

We will speak of this no more...

DK

Anonymous said...

I have a friend who changed her contact lenses after cutting habaneros...she's blind now. jk!

Sean might want to do this, as he dumps tabasco or chilis on everything I make. But how do you get the tabasco salsa into the tiny little bottles? ha ha

Anonymous said...

CUCUMBERS!! Cucumbers, people, are the thing when you get hot pepper in your eye or... other places. Put a slice of fresh cuke over the appropriate mucus membrane and you will be praising Jesus very quickly for relief. --Meredith

Robbie said...

MILK ALSO FOR BOTH EYE'S AND BURNING MOUTH
R
Robbie
Sout Africa

Anonymous said...

Other areas of the body are quite sensitive to the oils as well. Wash hands prior to using the powder room... and after.

dan0725 said...

I'm sorry, but I can't help myself, I was reading your comments and 20 minutes later still I'm laughing because you rubbed your eyes, nose or "somewhere else"
CAUTION is the first GOLDEN RULE to manage peppers (specialy TABASCO peppers), before cucumbers or milk or...

Anonymous said...


I inadvertently touched my reciprocating embryonic carbonizer after making hot sauce and in a month it dried up like a sun dried raisen and I flicked it off into basket and then had some fruit to make a jam.