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It's easy to get answers about health and nutrition! Just send your question by email to [email protected] and Dr. Harlan will respond to selected questions of general interest. Answers will be posted in the Ask Dr. Gourmet newsletter (sign up now!) and archived in the Ask Dr. Gourmet section of the website.

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Ask Dr. Gourmet

What is 'hot sauce'?

I am from New Zealand and I am not sure what "Hot Sauce" is. Can you give me some idea what is in it or some brands that may be available in our specialty shops? I would love to try the recipes containing it.

Dr. Gourmet Says...

a bottle of hot sauce on its side with sauce spilling out of it

In Dr. Gourmet recipes I use the generic term "Hot Sauce" because we try to avoid using brand names whenever we can. The most popular hot sauce in America is Tabasco®, a product made here in Louisiana. There are a number of alternative names for hot sauce, including "chili sauce" and "cayenne pepper sauce." There are hundreds of sauces made around the world, with the fundamental ingredient being cayenne (or other red) pepper.

The type that you use is entirely dependent on your ability to stand the heat in the kitchen (so to speak).

The heat of hot sauce and chilis is measured in Scoville units, a scale that was invented by Wilbur L. Scoville in 1912. His based this on the number of parts of sugar water that it would take to dilute the extract of chilies to the point that there is a barely detectable burn. While this seems a bit obsessive for my taste, pretty much anything over 5,000 scoville units is hot (let alone the sauces that advertise themselves as being 10, 20 or 100 times that hot).

As I mentioned, Dr. Gourmet recipes most often use Tabasco because this is the most widely available sauce in the U.S.. Tabasco sauce is rated at 5,000 S.U., equivalent to the heat of a jalapeno pepper.

One website that I know of, hotsauce.com, offers over a thousand different types, and here's a chili sauce made in New Zealand called Kaitaia Fire.

Here are some recipes calling for hot sauce:
Crab Cakes
Southwest Salmon Cakes
(Anything but) Basic Salmon Cakes
Thai Cucumber Salad
Shrimp Mirliton Casserole
Seared Okra with Cajun Glaze
Remoulade Dressing
Shrimp Gazpacho
Chicken and Andouille Gumbo
Red Beans & Rice
Sweet Red Pepper Barbecue Tuna

Thanks for writing,

Timothy S. Harlan, MD, FACP, CCMS
Dr. Gourmet