By Korsha Wilson, The New York Times
As a child, cookbook author Lesley Enston learned maybe the most important lesson about pepper sauce from her uncle Richard in Trinidad and Tobago: Be very careful when handling Scotch bonnet chiles.
“I will always remember coming back to the house in Princes Town and finding him on the couch with his hands up in the air covered in Vaseline,” she writes in her book, “Belly Full: Exploring Caribbean Cuisine Through 11 Fundamental Ingredients and Over 100 Recipes” (Ten Speed Press) released last month.
Asked what had happened, he shrugged. He said he’d just finished making a batch of his famous sauce, and the Scotch bonnets’ intense heat had burned his hands.
Uncle Richard’s recipe inspired Enston’s own, run through with earthy culantro (a fresh herb not to be confused with cilantro), garlic, whole-grain mustard and fresh ginger bolstering the fiery flavor of the essential Scotch bonnets.
Throughout the English- and French-speaking Caribbean, hot sauces — featuring a rotating cast of aromatics, vinegars, herbs, spices, even fruit — fill water bottles and jars in hues of oranges, reds, greens and light pinks. Some are chunky, others thin, but all carry fruit-forward heat and complexity when gently tipped on a plate of rice and peas, tender stewed saltfish or other dishes that benefit from its touch. But the Scotch bonnet, with its distinctive, tart, numbing heat, is always at the heart, adding a Caribbean inflection to dishes.
“They make me think of smoldering coals,” Enston said, speaking to their smoky, musky nature, adding, “I look at them, and I see my people: colorful, vibrant, spicy.”
Named for their bonnet-like shape, Scotch bonnet chiles are native to South America and crisscrossed the Atlantic Ocean as a result of the spice trade, taking root in Africa and Asia as well as Europe. In the Caribbean, they can be found piled high at grocery stores and markets, ready to be tossed whole into a bubbling pot of stew or cut and blended into pepper or “peppa” sauce.
“We love that pepper so much in the Caribbean,” said Andre Springer, the Barbadian American founder of Shaquanda’s Hot Pepper Sauce, a line of bottled hot sauces bearing the name of Springer’s drag persona. He often experiments with flavors when creating his pepper sauces, but Scotch bonnet is always included.
“Hot sauces can really be memories and homages to culture and experiences,” Springer said.
Growing up in Toronto, Enston’s mother would keep a bottle of her uncle Richard’s pepper sauce, carefully doling out a dollop of the yellow-orange sauce — “never pouring” — onto her plate. A little goes a long way.
“It’s not just the heat, it’s the flavors that come with it,” Enston said in her kitchen in Brooklyn, New York, where her daughter cuts the garlic, peels fresh ginger and adds them to the blender. (Enston takes care of the Scotch bonnets.) After a few seconds of blitzing them until nearly smooth, Enston jars the sauce for future use.
“The stuff lasts forever,” she said, placing the sauce in the refrigerator. “But not in this house.”
Recipe: Pepper Sauce
Recipe from Lesley Enston
Adapted by Korsha Wilson
Throughout the English and French-speaking Caribbean, homemade pepper sauce in glass jars or plastic bottles are an important part of the tablescape, kept within reach to add a burst of fruity, sharp heat to whatever is being eaten. This version, from cookbook author Lesley Enston, is earthy thanks to the addition of culantro, a fresh herb not to be confused with cilantro. From island to island, and even household to household, the recipe varies, but Scotch bonnets, the brightly colored bonnet-shaped chiles native to the region, are a must. Feel free to play around with this sauce to create one that matches your tastes, adjusting the seasonings or adding a pinch of a spice like clove or nutmeg. Keep a jar on hand to add a teaspoon or so to dishes from the Caribbean like braised oxtails or to serve as a condiment for dishes like fried snapper with Creole sauce. — KORSHA WILSON
Yield: Just over 1 cup
Total time: 12 minutes
Ingredients
- 15 Scotch bonnet chiles, halved lengthwise, seeds intact
- 3 seasoning peppers or Anaheim or Cubanelle peppers, halved lengthwise, seeds removed (optional; see Tip)
- 1 head of garlic, cloves smashed and peeled
- 6 culantro leaves (see Tip) or 1/2 cup fresh cilantro leaves and stems, roughly chopped
- 1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
- Juice of 1 lime
- 1 heaping tablespoon whole grain mustard
- 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt (such as Diamond Crystal) or 3/4 teaspoon fine salt
- 1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger
Preparation
1. Place all the ingredients in a food processor or blender and process for a few minutes until completely blended and almost smooth but still a touch chunky like a smoother chutney. If you want, taste and adjust the seasonings.
2. Transfer to a glass jar and store in the refrigerator to infinity. (If the sauce smells or looks off, it should be thrown out.)
Tips
Seasoning peppers are commonplace in Latin and Caribbean cooking, offering an earthy, slightly fruity bite similar to Scotch bonnets without the heat. Find them at your local Latin, Caribbean or African market. They can be frozen and kept for a few months or stay at room temperature for a few days and make a great addition to escovitch or any recipe that calls for bell peppers.
Culantro, also called chado beni, is cilantro’s earthier cousin used in Caribbean cooking to provide a punch of bright, vegetal flavor that adds a great background note to marinades and soups. You can find culantro at Latin and Caribbean markets. Keep the leaves wrapped in a damp paper towel to prevent them from drying out.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
