[1 - 1] if you made a venn diagram where one
[2 - 3] circle represented the people who are
[3 - 5] obsessed with the hottest hot sauces and
[5 - 6] the other circle was people who would
[6 - 9] swim with sharks on purpose i think you
[9 - 11] just have one circle that's not
[11 - 12] something i could save for many foods
[12 - 14] but then again not many foods make us
[14 - 15] feel pain trigger our adrenaline
[16 - 17] response and make us sweat like hot
[21 - 23] [Music] hot sauce is a feeling so let's talk
[23 - 25] hot sauce is a feeling so let's talk about that feeling we can't have hot
[25 - 26] sauce without chilis so that's where i
[26 - 28] want to start there are so many
[28 - 30] incredible chilies to choose from some
[30 - 32] are sweet and fruity others are earthy
[32 - 34] and grassy flavor matters a great deal
[34 - 36] when you're making hot sauce but i know
[36 - 38] what you're all here for the spice the
[38 - 40] heat the burn the potential to watch me
[40 - 42] eat a scotch bonnet chili the burn we
[42 - 44] get from chili's is primarily caused by
[44 - 46] the chemical substance capsaicin
[46 - 49] capsaicin stimulates the trpv1 nerves on
[49 - 51] our tongue in the same way that a really
[51 - 54] hot sip of coffee does it masquerades as
[54 - 56] actual heat and it tells your brain hey
[56 - 58] there's a really hot situation down here
[58 - 60] in the mouth that trick is called
[60 - 62] chemist thesis the chemical stimulation
[62 - 65] of tactile nerves that's very cool the
[65 - 67] capsaicin in chili's isn't all that well
[67 - 68] distributed throughout the fruit and
[68 - 69] there's actually not that much of it in
[69 - 71] the flesh check out this experiment we
[71 - 73] separated the flesh ribs and seeds from
[73 - 74] 40 jalapenos and sent them to an
[74 - 77] independent lab for capsaicin analysis
[77 - 79] on average there were five milligrams of
[79 - 81] capsaicin per kilo of flesh 73
[81 - 84] milligrams per kilo in the seeds and 512
[84 - 86] milligrams per kilo in the ribs that's
[86 - 88] right the heat in chiles is found
[88 - 90] primarily in the ribs now it's true that
[90 - 91] the seeds are spicy but that's entirely
[92 - 93] by association they sit on the white
[93 - 95] ribs and they pick up capsaicin let's do
[95 - 97] a lineup of commonly available chilies
[97 - 99] from mildest to hottest that would be
[99 - 101] bell peppers cubanelles poblanos
[102 - 105] anaheims cherries jalapenos fresnos
[105 - 107] serranos bird chilies habaneros and
[107 - 109] scotch bonnets those numbers that were
[109 - 111] popping up on the screen are scoville
[111 - 112] heat units the reflection of the
[112 - 114] spiciness of the chili now the bigger
[114 - 115] the number the bigger the burn the
[115 - 118] scoville scale was invented in 1912 by
[118 - 120] wilbur scoville it was based on a panel
[120 - 122] of human tasters evaluating how much a
[122 - 124] given chili sample needed to be diluted
[124 - 126] with sugar water before it no longer
[126 - 128] tasted hot a single drop of extract from
[128 - 130] a million scoville rated chili yeah
[130 - 132] those exist needed to be diluted with 1
[132 - 134] million drops of water before it was
[134 - 136] deemed as mild as bell pepper pure
[136 - 139] isolated capsaicin ranks at 16 million
[139 - 141] scoville units nowadays scoville scores
[141 - 142] are determined not by mouth but by
[142 - 145] machine you know it seems like chilies
[145 - 147] get hotter and hotter every year with
[147 - 149] growers introducing new varieties with
[149 - 151] frankly terrifying names the trinidad
[151 - 154] moruga scorpion chile clocks in at 1.2
[154 - 156] million scoville units the trinidad
[156 - 159] scorpion butch t variety clocks in at
[159 - 161] 1.46 million the carolina reaper
[161 - 164] averages 1.6 million and the dragon's
[164 - 166] breath chile supposedly clocks in at
[166 - 168] well over 2 million scoville units i'm
[168 - 170] pretty sure that even as i'm saying this
[170 - 171] there are chili's being picked from
[171 - 174] plants that top the ones in this list
[174 - 176] it's a spicy arms race that frankly
[176 - 178] i'm really not that interested in if you
[178 - 180] looked at chilis purely for their
[180 - 181] capsaicin punch you're missing out on
[181 - 183] what makes them so amazing their flavor
[183 - 185] the most popular hot sauces out there
[185 - 187] forego these massive spice bombs in
[187 - 189] favor of much more moderate chilies that
[189 - 191] allows them to use more chilies and get
[191 - 193] more chili flavor without getting burned
[193 - 195] and that is good practice for us home
[195 - 197] hot sauce makers as well you can make a
[197 - 198] nice hot sauce by blendering moderately
[198 - 201] spicy chilies with water vinegar some
[201 - 203] salt and some sugar spicy fresh and
[203 - 205] delicious but you can make a much more
[205 - 206] interesting one if you add a
[206 - 208] fermentation step to the process so
[208 - 210] let's go to the kitchen and do just that
[210 - 212] i like a hot sauce with manageable spice
[212 - 214] and loads of flavor so i'm going with
[214 - 216] fresno chilies for this one as we saw in
[216 - 218] that chili lineup fresnos are in the
[218 - 219] middle of the pack in terms of heat
[219 - 222] they're in the 2500 to 10 000 scoville
[222 - 223] range to complement that we're actually
[223 - 225] gonna also add some carrot which will
[225 - 226] give us more flavor and some additional
[226 - 228] sweetness and a little bit of garlic for
[228 - 230] good measure now fermenting these
[230 - 231] vegetables couldn't be much easier and
[232 - 233] it all starts with a simple brine of
[233 - 235] water and salt we'll steal a little bit
[235 - 236] of this brine to make a brine filled
[236 - 238] weight and that will allow us to keep
[238 - 240] the vegetables submerged and away from
[240 - 241] air you'll see what i mean then we just
[241 - 243] dump in our chilies our carrots and our
[243 - 245] garlic we top with a little square of
[245 - 246] parchment our brine weight and cover the
[246 - 248] whole thing in cheesecloth this will
[248 - 249] hang out at room temperature on the
[249 - 251] counter for five to seven days until
[251 - 253] everything is savory and sour this is
[253 - 255] lacto-fermentation at work where salt
[255 - 257] keeps unfriendly bacteria at bay and
[257 - 259] allows lactobacillus bacteria to do its
[259 - 261] thing creating a sour and delicious
[261 - 263] environment then we just puree
[263 - 265] everything until mostly smooth and then
[265 - 266] strain out the solids now don't throw
[266 - 268] out those solids they're just as
[268 - 269] flavorful as the hot sauce and they make
[269 - 271] an incredible spread for sandwiches then
[271 - 273] we return the strain sauce to the
[273 - 275] blender and season it up with salt sugar
[275 - 277] and vinegar and now you have a choice to
[277 - 279] make xanthan or nosanthen xanthan gum is
[280 - 282] a powerful hydrocolloid its long
[282 - 284] string-like molecules tangle up into a
[284 - 285] web when they get wet and that micro
[286 - 287] scale web slows down any water that
[287 - 289] tries to flow through it check out this
[290 - 292] experiment here is plain water and here's water
[292 - 293] here is plain water and here's water with increasing concentrations of
[293 - 295] xanthan gum you can see that with just
[295 - 297] one percent xanthan in the mix the
[297 - 299] liquid is highly thickened and at four
[299 - 302] and eight percent it's uh
[302 - 304] kind of snotty now for comparison check
[304 - 305] out this batch of water that was
[305 - 307] thickened with one percent cornstarch
[307 - 309] it's much thinner than the one xanthan
[309 - 311] because xanthan gum is so powerful we
[311 - 313] can achieve the texture we want by using
[313 - 314] just a little bit here's our hot sauce
[314 - 316] without xanthan gum and here it is with
[316 - 319] xanthan gum a huge difference in texture
[319 - 321] cook's choice for my batch i'm going
[321 - 322] with xanthan gum and i'm just going to
[322 - 324] stream it into the blender while it's
[324 - 326] running no heating required then we just
[326 - 328] bottle our hot sauce in this adorable
[328 - 330] hot sauce bottle and look around for the
[330 - 332] very first thing we can shake it on oh
[332 - 333] look here's a perfectly fried sunny side
[333 - 337] up egg that'll do and this is how to eat
[341 - 343] [Music] thanks for watching now before you head
[343 - 344] thanks for watching now before you head off for your shark dive do me a favor
[344 - 346] let me know in the comments what your
[346 - 348] favorite hot sauce brand is and hit that
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