Reproduction Chile Sauce with the Secret Ingredient

I've researched condiment recipes as much as I can. These types of recipes are closely guarded secrets. Think Coca-Cola. They don't want a copy of that getting out.

I've always wanted to make my own chile sauce. Pardon the other writer's misspelling, as it should not be chili.

Some while ago, I had found a cookbook author, one Gisine Lemcke, who ran a cooking school in Brooklyn NY in the late 19th early 20th century.

Below is her recipe. It's use of green tomatoes will impart that slight tang that chile sauce has, and that ketchup does not have. Heinz Chili Sauce sells at a premium to Heinz Ketchup. Now you know why.

Preserving and Pickling
By Gesine Lemcke
New York: Appleton, 1919

https://www.google.com/books/edition/Preserving_and_Pickling/08pDAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1

Chili Sauce No 1

24 ripe tomatoes
15 green tomatoes
4 large onions
3 green peppers
4 tablespoonfuls of salt
2 tablespoonfuls sugar
1 quart of vinegar
1-2 tsp. cloves
1-2 tsp. allspice
1-2 tsp. ginger
1-2 tsp. cinnamon

Scald and free the ripe tomatoes from their skin and cut them in small pieces. Cut also the green tomatoes, the peeled onions and the green peppers, put all the ingredients in a kettle boil slowly 1 2 hours. 

Mrs. Lemcke, does not describe more than the above. Maybe this will cook to the correct consistency and not need a milling, but keep that in mind. Some bits are acceptable. I imagine Heinz removes the seeds from theirs as that would impart a bitter note.

If preserving with sodium benzoate, remember not more than .1%, that is .001 by weight. Add the benzoate after cooking, but before the pot reaches room temperature.

Lao Gan Ma Noodles And It's Celebrated Sauce

There are a number of jarred sauces from China which seems to have the notion of family or relatives involved with the name or on the label. One such is, in Chinese:

Guiyang Nanming Laoganma Flavor Food Co., Ltd. was started by a woman named Tao Huabi 陶华碧 and has a fascinating history. She keeps her company unlisted, does not borrow from banks to expand her company and is named in Forbes Magazine as one of wealthiest Chinese. The company names roughly translates into English as The Old Godmother.

The products page. All in Chinese. Untranslated. (And somewhat untranslatable unless you are fluent in both Chinese and cookery.)

As the sauce obtains pride of place in this dish, I giving a double quantity. Sauce your noodles well, and serve the extra for diners who like more of it.

I prefer egg noodles for this dish, but classically it's served on rice noodles.

Protein:

1 pound of flank steak or pork loin, cut into matchsticks
1 tbs of garlic paste
2 tsp of ginger paste
1 tsp light soy

Carbohydrates:

16 oz noodles, chopped into bite size lengths. I cut the package into sixths.
1/2 to 3/4 cup of raw peanuts
1 package of pickled Sichuan vegetable (rinsed in water and chopped a little)
2 (or more) gai lan, coarsely chopped (Chinese broccoli)

Sauce:

4 tsp light soy
2 tsp dark soy
1-2 tsp black vinegar
2 tsp sesame oil (Kadoya brand recommended)
2-4 tbs scallions, cut in 1/8 inch slices
2 tsp ginger paste
1 tbs garlic paste
2 tsp white sesame seeds toasted
3 tbs Old Godmother Sauce (or any brand of chile bean sauce or "paste")
5 tbs peanut oil
1 cup cilantro, chopped with stems

Heat a dry skillet and toast the sesame seeds until they darken in color. Remove and reserve to cool. Slice the meat into matchsticks. Neatness doesn't count here too much. If you have a box grater or Microplane, reduce the garlic and ginger to a paste. (I prefer the term mush.) Mix the pastes into the meat and add 1 tsp of light soy, reserve.

Mix the soy sauces, vinegar, sesame oil, preserved vegetable, garlic, ginger, godmother, sesame seeds and scallions in a metal container. Reserve. Metal because hot wok cooking oil will be added shortly.

Heat a 2 quart or larger pot with water to cook the noodles. Add no salt. Use enough water to almost cover all the noodles. Put on high heat, uncovered. When the noodles start to simmer, remove from the heat and drain the noodles in a colander. Reserve.

Heat the wok, add the oil. On low heat, fry the peanuts for 5 to 7 minutes. Remove from the wok and add to the sauce.

Put the heat up to high on the wok. Add more peanut oil, at least 3 tbs. When starting to smoke, add the marinated meat in batches so as to not cool the wok too much. Stir fry and brown some of the meat, when browned remove to a bowl and stir fry the remaining meat. Use the Chinese spade (spatula) tool to remove the browned meat, allowing the oil to drain back to the bottom of the wok.

When all the meat is cooked, pour half of the hot oil into the reserved sauce. It will sizzle for a few seconds. Put the wok back on the heat, and while it is reheating, stir the oil into the sauce using a teaspoon or long handled spoon.

Add the noodles to the wok and stir fry them a few minutes. If some of the noodles brown a little that's excellent. Add the gai lan. Add 2 tbs of water to the wok, stir the noodles and gai lan. Cover for 2 to 3 minutes to steam the gai lan. Remove the wok, add the meat, stir to mix well. Add the sauce and stir again. Recover the wok, put on lowest heat. Wait 5 minutes. Serve with chopped cilanto. Have extra light soy, sesame oil and Sriracha sauce available for diners to help themselves.

Cook's Note: some sauces call themselves sauce others call themselves paste. They all work exactly alike.

508. Court-bouillon.*

Take three carrots, four onions, six shallots, and two roots of parsley, which pick and wash. Mince them. Put a small lump of butter into a stewpan, with the above roots, and fry them till they begin to get brown. Moisten next with two bottles of red wine, a bottle of water, a handful of salt, some whole peppercorns, and a bunch of parsley and green onions, seasoned with thyme, bay leaves, sweet basil, cloves, &c.

Let the whole stew for an hour, and then strain it through a sieve, to use as occasion may require. If you should have no wine, put in some vinegar. The court-bouillon is better after having been served several times than on the first day. It is excellent for stewing crawfish. Any wine will do for
the court-bouillon, even if sour. It is a famous thing for stewing crawfish.

* This is a very proper dish for a Roman Catholic family during Lent. It is always good; only add a glass of wine to it every time you use it. Use it for marinade, &c. &c.

The above recipe is taken from

THE French Cook; or, The Art of Cookery Developed in All It's Various Branches. by Louis Eustache Ude. Formerly Cook to Louis XVI, King of France and at Present Cook to the Right Honorable Earl of Sefton.

LONDON : Printed for the AUTHOR, and sold by J. EBERS, 27, Old Bond Street; and may be had of all the Booksellers in the United Kingdom. 1813.

The above exists in several editions, the dates of those range from 1813 to 1841.

I reproduce the above as it reminds me of the famous Chinese lu shui sauce (Master sauce) which must be reboiled every few days to keep it from spoiling. And I'm certain that this stock would require that too, after it's first use with poaching or simmering fish. In the past, the court bouillons I have made have been frozen and that eliminates the need for reboiling every few days.

By "after a few times" is meant that the fish flavor becomes more pronounced on the tongue after being used a few times. That is certainly true for the lu shui as well. A necessary.

Parsley roots are a relatively modern addition to the foodstuffs I see at produce markets. I don't recall such as little as 25 years ago.

By way of comparison, here is a court bouillon recipe I found two decades ago.

Barataria Bay Terrebonne Estuary Fish Court bouillon

1 cup cooking oil
4 bay leaves
water (approx. 2 quarts)
flour
6 lbs redfish
2 large onions, chopped
1 can tomatoes
1 tbl Italian seasoning
1 can tomato sauce
1 small jar green olives, chopped
Salt and red pepper to taste
1 can mushrooms
2 large bell peppers, chopped fine
2 heads garlic, grated
1 cup green onion tops, chopped
1/2 stalk celery, chopped fine
2/3 cup parsley, chopped

Heat cooking oil in heavy pot; add flour and cook until dark golden brown. Add onions, bell pepper and celery; cook about 5 minutes. Add tomatoes, tomato sauce, olives, bay leaves, and water. Adjust amount of water according to desired thickness of gravy. Cook on medium heat about 1 1/2 hours.

Add fish (fried, precooked or raw), mushrooms and grated garlic. Cook about 1 hour. Add onion tops, parsley, Italian seasoning, salt and water. Simmer, on low heat, slightly covered, for 1/2 hour. Serve on hot rice or spaghetti.

The Barataria Bay recipe is reproduced here as the website that hosted it is no longer publishing it. 

You Missa Harissa (apologies)

I should have titled this post: I missa Harissa. 

It's taken a great deal of time to collect what seem to me authentic recipes for ras el hanout and harissa. The words had to be translated in to Arabic and searches performed, and facts obtained at great effort.

Here is my report on Harissa. (say: hairissa)

I use chile as the correct spelling. You may also see chili, chilli, chille.

Harissa is usually called a paste. Commercially it comes in tubes, and cans. More modern manufacturers are putting it in glass jars. A recent (August 2016) trip to the gourmet shop showed jars (10 oz.) for $10 to $12 a jar. Same at a supermarket was $6. That's pricey stuff for chile paste. Chinese Lee Kum Kee Garlic Chili Sauce is under $4.

Why is it called paste and not sauce? I conjecture that it was sold in tubes and when the Arabs (maybe specifically Tunisians) started exporting it to the USA, they had to tell the US gov't. what it was and they learned that stuff in tubes is “paste”, like toothpaste or painters inks (sold in tubes). So paste stuck, and while harissa is thick like a paste, it's a sauce because it is often mixed with other ingredients, before being incorporated into a recipe.

At right is a label of one Tunisian maker's. It shows having 14% solids of chiles. Another brand I saw had 73%. So maybe that limns the amount of heat, but as I want to make my own, those percentages are but guidelines. The chiles are 50,000 on the Scoville Scale. But that isn't too important. The flavor should be what matters. Heat can be controlled by the addition of tomato sauce or other diluters. I manage heat by finding the weight of the ingredients, the heat scale of the specific chile and making a ratio and proportion. In the recipe below, about 964 grams of ingredients are mixed with 12 grams of Habanero chile (976 grams total weight). Because the Habanero has 300,000 Scoville units, if I were using chiles with 50,000 Scoville units, I would need 6 times as much weight to obtain the same amount of spiciness. The math is now easy, 6 times 12 grams is 72 grams. Yes, sometimes chiles vary by heat and Habaneros are reported at having between 250,000 and 300,000. I can only suggest using a pinch extra chile flakes and stand the batch overnight to get hotter.

From what I read, some makers use tomatoes. Some use hard to get or expensive spices such as: cubeb peppers, acerola berries,  safron, et alia. My modest understanding is that this sauce is widely “canned” by home gardeners and frozen flat in plastic freezer bags for use throughout the year. My original reading on it suggested a whisper of mustard powder and mint would work the magic and that's what I'm pursuing, below. That's the secret ingredient. I'm going to use some sodium benzoate in mine as I have no space in the freezer. (usage rate for this is .1% — one tenth of one percent weight by weight). If you want to be a traditionalist, after the sauce is in it's storage container, cover it with the oil you used to make the sauce.

Some of the “modern” harissa recipes start with dried chiles, reconstitute them and grind them in a food-processor to a “paste". Others use bell peppers. Some whole tomatoes.

It takes adding extra olive oil to make their recipes work. I shall avoid them here, as I consider the recipe comes from a time before electricity. Yes that means using a mortar, but I will use a food-processor, but not with reconstituted, watered down foods. Soaking the chiles in water or liquids and discarding the bulk of the liquids is like throwing the flavor away.  It defeats the purpose of making the homemade foodstuff. I know that some of Mexican cuisine reconstitutes chiles and makes sauce. But I have no evidence that the Maghrebis do this, except for the lady's post from the Catskills. For the sake of completeness, I'm offering a link to the sauce made with dried chiles. It won't have the nice bright red color, but you may find it to your liking.

Too much cumin flavor for me

I saw one video where the lady has 12 pounds of fresh Cayenne chiles. A brief search for Cayennes fresh from a market yields no results. So those are homegrown only. I have no garden. I would like my sauce to make 2 cups. My guesstimate is to use two pounds of chiles. If that yields more than 2 cups, I have an extra jar.

I want this sauce to be a bright red and will include a little tomato paste to help with the color. As tomato paste is a thickener, I may use a little fresh but peeled tomato to thin it somewhat. It also will have a little sugar to balance the tomato flavor. As it turned out, the tomato was unnecessary.

Habanero Hiding Amongst the New Mexican

The last time I saw ripe red jalapeños at the market they were $5.00 a pound. That's a bit pricey as green jalapeños can get to 3 pounds for a dollar late in the season. However I found red New Mexico chiles at $2 a pound at the market and used them. Some Arabic author calls for roasted chiles. I find fresh vegetables don't roast (toast) well, unless subjected to open flame. I don't have an appliance capable of doing that. That is to say, I'm not putting them on the bbq grill and blazing away just to approximate the unusual chile from the Maghreb that has a smokey-raiseney taste. Select chiles that are heavy for their size.

Photo Courtesy of David DeWitt, Albuquerque New Mexico

List of Ingredients

740 g red New Mex Chile (1¾ lbs.)
22 g garlic (1 head)
12 g Habanero chile (1 large)
10 g cumin (2 tsp.)
10 g caraway (2 tsp.)
12 g mustard (1 scant tbs.)
15 g water (1 tbs.)
1 gram mint leaves, fresh (12 to 15 leaves)
10 g black pepper
15 g salt (1 tbs.)
50 mL lemon juice (¼ cup or 2 fl. ozs.)
75 mL Olive oil (3 tbs. — depending on the chiles, this varies)
.9 grams sodium benzoate

Optional Ingredients: Saffron, Preserved lemon, Smokey Paprika, Coriander, Fenugreek, Turmeric, Sumac, Fennel, Onion and Ginger

I give the weights in grams and volumes as I want the sauce to be flavorful, but not too hot.

The red chiles, but not the Habanero, are simmered in water, covered for 15 minutes. This time isn't critical, but what is requisite is to soften the chiles. Leave them whole with the stems intact. Remove them to a colander to drain and cool. While the chiles are being softened, collect and weigh the other ingredients.

After 5 minutes of cooling the chiles are cool enough to touch. But before you do that, put on pair of nitrile or latex gloves. This will protect your hands from the heat of cooking and the heat from the Habanero, too. This is an important step.

Pre-heat a small skillet. I prefer my 6" cast iron. Any will do. This is how the cumin and caraway will be toasted. If you want more or other spices, such as coriander, add or subtract, ad lib.

Stem and remove most of the seeds. Set aside. If the spice skillet is hot, toast the spices, checking them for aroma. It's pretty obvious when they change from raw to toasted by the aroma. Make the mustard. If you don't have powder, use yellow or Dijon. If you are making the mustard, cover and reserve a minimum of 10 minutes for the flavor to develop. 

Remaining Ingredients

Peel the garlic and while wearing gloves cut the Habanero in pieces. Reserve.

While the coriander seeds are pictured here, I forgot them this time. On balance, I would use more caraway, mint and mustard in the next batch. That's a personal preference only.

If you have an electric spice grinder, put the salt, black peppercorns and all the other spices in it, except the garlic, mustard and mint. If you are using sodium benzoate, add it too. Grind to a fine powder. Reserve.

Tear the red chiles into strips, lengthwise. This helps the food processor blade do it's job. Put them into the food processor bowl. Pulse a few times, to make the beginning of the sauce. Next add the Habanero and the garlic. Pulse to blend. Add the spices, mint and lemon juice. Pulse to blend. Lastly with the blade spinning, stream in the olive oil. To not overprocess, we are looking for a chunkiness.

Hotter Than Thou!

I have my jar sitting on the kitchen counter and after 3 days, the flavors are blending beautifully and getting even tastier. The sauce continues to thicken and will need a little water to make it as thick as ketchup.

I put about a teaspoon in a bowl of fava beans and it brightened the bland bean flavor nicely.

Typical uses are on hamburgers, chicken wings, pasta, as a chicken marinade — diluted with vinegar and oil. Add a spoonfull to a bowl of Kalamata or mixed black and green olives as a mezze or tapa.

Huy Fong Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce 35th Anniversary Bottle

I finally got to Irwindale near Los Angeles and toured the Huy Fong Foods, Inc. 650,000 square foot factory.

After the plant tour, our small group was taken to a gift shop. All the proceeds go to charity. We were all given however, a very unique gift. David Tran's genius has prospered for 35 years and he has made a 35th anniversary bottle of his celebrated Sriracha Hot Chili Sauce. He has never raised the price of his products in those 35 years. To me that is real genius. The bottle says 2015 chili grinding to note it as a vintage year sauce. For what it's worth, sriracha is pronounced: sree ra cha, not like Jack in the Box Clown, saying "siracha". Sri means "beautiful", like Sri Lanka.

One Of A Kind

Marinara Sauce and Meatballs

This is my favorite recipe for Meatball Sandwiches, the recipe for which, follows.


Preparation time is about 10 to 15 minutes and cooking time is exactly 30 minutes.


Ingredients


* 1 Tbs. olive oil, extra virgin
* 8 ozs. onions, chopped
* 2 whole garlic cloves, minced
* 8 oz. tomato sauce, canned
* 6 ozs. tomato paste, canned
* 14 1/2 ozs. chicken stock, canned
* 1/2 tsp. sugar
* 1 whole bay leaf
* 1 tsp. basil leaf, dried, hand crushed
* 2 tbs. parsley, chopped
* 1/2 c. bell pepper, red, roasted, diced (optional)
* 4 ozs. mushrooms, button, wiped clean (optional)
* 1 tbs. chicken boullion powder (optional)
* 16 fl. ozs. water (optional)
* 1 tbs. onion powder (optional)
* 1 tsp. garlic powder (optional)
* 1 tbs. italian seasoning (optional)
* 1/2 tsp. chile flakes (optional)
* 1 whole lemon, juiced (optional but highly recommended)


Instructions


Chop the onions and mince the garlic and parsley, keep each in it's own bowl.


Heat the oil in a sauce pan, lightly caramelize the onions and garlic. Add the chicken stock or 16 ozs. of water and a heaping tablespoon of chicken boullion powder. Bring to a boil, and lower to a simmer. Add the remaining ingredients and return to a simmer. Cover and simmer 15 minutes. Add the optional ingredients if using them. Remove lid, reduce for another 15 to 20 minutes to thicken.


The above can be easily doubled




Meatballs for the above


Ingredients


* 6 lbs. beef, ground
* 2 c. breadcrumbs
* 1 c. romano cheese -- grated
* 1/2 c. parsley -- chopped
* 5 cloves garlic -- minced
* 5 whole eggs
* 1/2 c. chicken stock
* 2 tsp. black pepper
* 2 tsp. salt
* 3/4 c. onions -- finely chopped (optional)


Instructions


Remove meat 20 minutes before working it into meatballs.
In a mixing bowl mix the breadcrumbs, cheese, garlic, parsley, black pepper and salt. Next, add the eggs and stock. Mix thoroughly. Into another larger bowl, break the meat up into bits. With wet hands, mix the flavoring mixture into the meat, keeping the hands wet to prevent the meat from smearing the fat.


Grease a casserole (better still: a hotel pan) and put the meatballs on it as the 50 to 60 are made. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Put the pan in the oven for 6 to 8 minutes until the bottoms of the meatballs brown. Turn them over, reduce the heat to 350 degrees and bake 25 to 35 minutes until they are fully browned. Remove from the oven, drain all the fat, add a tablespoon of the sauce over each meatball and cover with aluminum foil, and return to the oven for 30 minutes.


I always end up having to run more than one batch through the oven and the work always takes 4 to 5 hours. I promise you, if you love meatballs & spaghetti, this is worth the effort.


Optional: minced onions
Optional in sauce for sandwiches: sautéed mushrooms, bell pepper strips, Italian sausage bites.




From:
Daily News (a newspaper)
Food Section
4/15/98

Cranberry Tangerine Sauce

Cranberry Sauce

Servings: 20
Cooking time: 10 minutes
Preparation time: 15 minutes
Category: Condiments
Cuisine: American
Rating: 5/5 stars
Ingredients
12 ounces cranberries
8 ozs. sugar
8 fl. ounces tangerine juice (4 medium size)
1 tbs. tangerine zest (see note below)

Instructions

Measure the sugar, reserve. Zest the tangerines. Reserve the zest, covered. Juice the tangerines, measure the liquid and add water to make 8 fl. ozs. of liquid. Add the cup of sugar to the juice in a sauce pan. Stir to dissolved. Put the pan over heat, bring to a low simmer, whence add the cranberries, cover and simmer 10 to 12 minutes to burst the berries. Allow to cool for 10 minutes off the heat, add the reserved zest. Stir. Cool to room temperature and refrigerate.

Notes: If you can get more than 1 tablespoon of zest, that is better, but 1 tablespoon is the minimum.

I thought of using tangerine juice & zest in Albuquerque New Mexico in 1994.