This quick post brought to you by traveling and cold weather.

Hi, there! Are you cold this January? I know I’ve been a few times. I know I’ve also been perplexed by some oddly warm, muggy days.

But those days aside, do you want something to warm you up? Got hot peppers? (You shouldn’t, unless you’re in more southerly climes, or have frozen a crapload from summer, or are reading this in the summertime.) Let’s make something out of them, shall we?

As I recounted in my Ghost Pepper post ages ago, we had quite the bumper crop of hot peppers, especially of the ghost variety, and I needed to find something to do with over 80 extra peppers by the end of the season. Enter simple hot sauce.

I told you this was a quick post, so let’s get to the recipes!

Simple Hot Sauce

This makes quite the vinegary sauce (which I personally like). You can cut through the vinegar by adding sugar to taste. You can also cut down on the heat by removing the seeds and membranes of peppers before cooking.

You will need:

• hot peppers of choice – these can be a combination of whatever you want, or one type of pepper
• enough vinegar to cover the peppers in a saucepan
• 1-2 tsp sugar (optional)

Directions:

1. Place peppers in a saucepan large enough to allow for several inches of headspace between the peppers and the lip of the pan. Pour in vinegar. Bring to a boil, then cover and allow to simmer on low for 10-20 minutes until the vinegar is infused with peppers.
2. Remove pan from heat, and allow to cool for 5-10 minutes. Place mixture in a blender or food processor (make sure you leave the vent cover off of the blender and use a towel to allow steam to escape), and blend until homogenous and smooth.
3. Strain mixture through a fine mesh strainer into desired containers. You can store this in the refrigerator for quite some time (vinegar is a heck of a preservative), or can it using the hot water bath method.

Roasted Hot Pepper Sauce: This is a bit sweeter, smokier, and brings out the flavor of the hot peppers in a pleasant way. Roast the peppers either on the grill, smoker, or oven until blistered, but not totally blackened. You can choose whether to remove the skins (I left mine on), and proceed with the recipe.