Pain Is Good Jamaican Hot Sauce Review

I thought I would follow on from the review of Levi Roots with Pain is Good Jamaican Hot Sauce. Each bottle of Pain is Good range from the USA comes with the same distinct labels of someone in pain enjoying the wonderful sauce inside. I like this shape of bottle for any sauce and even the label comes with a mini story:

"In the jungles of Jamaica, far from the soft, white beaches and luxury resorts, there's a small shack with a small garden. In the garden, Scotch Bonnet and Habanero peppers are grown. In the shack, jerk sauce is made with them. In the mouths of those who eat it, a strange voodoo begins to take hold, consuming the body, mind and soul in a fiery, hypnotic euphoria. In this bottle is that sauce. In this world there is no sensational quite like it"

This hot sauce has classic Jamaican seriously hot flavour, but with plenty more to offer than cheap imitations. The heat comes from the powerful habanero pepper alongside a sharp twang from pineapple juice and finally jerk seasoning giving the characteristic Jamaican taste you expect.

I tried this sauce for the first time in August 2011 in a new chilli shop in Brighton run by Chilli Pepper Pete. On first taste I was a little disappointed as there was definitely Jamaican flavour but it just lacked something. I bought a bottle to experiment with and quickly learnt that this sauce comes alive when added to chicken for a classic Jerk style dish... obviously with rice and peas!

Adding Pain is Good Jamaican Hot Sauce to simple dishes like good old cheese on toast is a definite winning combo too, (you will never use worchestershire sauce again) A few dollops in your bolognese also brings it alive from the sale old dish. Generally this sauce appears to go better with cooked dishes rather than as a dipping sauce. However it is a great one to have in your fridge to add a twist to many dishes to surprise your guests and sometimes even yourself when you re-heat the next day and forget you have added hababeros!

Pick up some Pain is Good Jamaican Hot Sauce from Scorchio  by clicking here clicking here



There are many other bottles in the range so pulling together a set will make a great gift for any chili head. click on one of the pictures below to pick up a bottle of a different flavour

Pain is Good - Batch #114 Sweet Caribbean Jerk Screamin' Wing Sauce

Pain is Good - Batch #164 Honey Cayenne Mustard Sauce

The Green Chile takes a hot ride into space by NASA

Check out this video link below. A project to roast chile in space is one of three dozen experiments by New Mexico school kids and college students that has lifted off on a NASA-funded flight travelling 70 miles into space to bring chili heat to an all new level.

Chili in Space

Home Grown 2011: Chilli Grow Update

Its almost full harvest time here for my chilli crops! I have been testing this year for the first time the chiligrow from greenhouse sensation. I started with a store bought Hungarian Hot Wax, home grown Jalapeno and finally my Krakatoa chili plant is in its third year picked up from the west dean chilli fiesta which was looking on its last legs. My last update from July showed very health plants and as you can see below at the en of August each plant is looking full,  healthy and most importantly full of chilli's! Each plant continues to fruit still, I have decided to leave as many of the chilli's on as possible to get really ripe fruit this year rather than picking them for a larger crop.

I met the nice folk at Greenhouse sensation at this years west dean chilli fiesta and they were very friendly. The even gave me some fresh chili peppers and and chilli chocolate just for being a customer! I can whole heatedly recommend picking yourself up a chilli grow for your back garden. Whether you are a newbie, seasoned grower or just after a better crop with a bit less effort the chiligrow. Ill be picking up another one or two units for next year definitely.

Above is my mini chili greenhouse made with a number of spare bricks and a cold frame plonked on without the aid of the chilli grow these have done well due to late starts and not enough loving care they are a little smaller with less fruit.

 The chilli pepper nasu above i fed with the leftover chemicals for the chilli grow water reservoir and as you can see since stripping the plant bare from chillis in July i have a full sent i can harvest again already for my next meal!

Can you find any padron peppers in the supermarket this year? i cant, above I have a couple of padron plants I hope to get at least one meal from and a pyramid chilli plant where most of the peppers are ripening nicely ready to be preserved

Lastly for the veggie gardeners among you that grow chillis on the side I thought I'd include a picture of this years onion crop the will be filling my fajitas and spicy meals until the end of the year. 

I Hope your season has been successful too, ill try and post a picture of my harvest before I eat them all

Caribbean Food Made Easy Cook Book Review

Levi Roots has now become part of everyday food with some of his products after his successful Dragons Den appearance. I have met Levi and his son on a number of occasions at various food festivals and chili events round the county. I have to be honest and say that I don't like his famous reggae reggae sauces even though I have a signed bottle on my shelf! However I can say that his cook book is great. In the BBC2 program, Caribbean Food Made Easy, Levi Roots travels around the UK and the Caribbean and reveals how delicious Caribbean food can be prepared at home with easy to prepare, mouth-watering recipes using fresh, healthy and readily available ingredients. The show consisted consist of four 30 minute shows demonstrating 3-4 dishes per program. The book that you get accompanying this mini show includes 100 delicious Caribbean recipes, including all of those that appear on the TV program.

The book wonderfully colorful and well illustrated with a nice introduction to the common ingredients in Caribbean cooking at the front of the book easing you into the recipes ahead. The recipes are divided into several sections like: one pot & suppers, fish and seafood, beach and street food, drinks and deserts. The use of fresh ingredients such as pineapple and hot scotch bonnet really bring this food to life is you are willing to experiment. I can definitely recommend the Jamaican pork chops and sticky jerk wings with sugared oranges!

Pick up a copy of this scotch bonnet laden recipe book from amazon by clicking here of the picture below and get some fruity Caribbean food into your regular cooking

Why not add some authentic caribbean hot sauce to your food too by clicking Ned's Old Time Hell Hot Pepper Sauce here or on teh picture above to get a bottle from scorchio.

Make us a Brew Mint and Chilli Tea Bags Review

Make Us A Brew Mint Chilli Tea Bags caught my attention at a recent food show. I like tea..... I like chilli... whats this chilli tea.... let me try some!

The cartoon covered box contains 25 orgnic tea bags and tells you the story of this special tea was invented:

"After my little mishap with the chillies in the kitchen, we wasted no time in getting a proper blen together. My favourite mint brew, a blend of peppermint & spearmint was combined with a pinch of chilli to give it a cheeky twist without going over the top."

When making the tea you will find that the chilli takes a little longer to infuse than the mint, so the longer you leave the bag in, the more chilli you will taste! this way the tea can be as hot as you like to wake you up in the morning! The tea itself feels like many herbal teas but this one definately gives you a tingle.

The Chilli Tea Bags are also made by a bloke called Mr. Scruff who is a DJ, producer and cartoonist! This tea has been tested at festivals such as Glastonbury, Big Chill and Womad which led to it being produced for the rest of us to try.

Make a change to your daily routine tea and pick up some Make Us A Brew Mint & Chilli Tea Bags from Scorchio by clicking here. How long will you leave the tea bag in for.........

Mad Dog Green Amigo Hot Sauce Review:

Mad Dog Green Amigo Hot Sauce is one of the tasty mild sauces in the Mad Dog Range. Why Mad Dog for a name... one you have seen their other sauces like Mad Dog 38 Special Pepper Extract - 3 Million Scovilles you will understand

But back to the Green Amigo. The bottle has their signature dog on the front, this time shaking his maracas and saying:

"Experience the mouth watering combination of fresh ingredients in Green Amigo and transport your taste buds somewhere south of the border."

This is very true of the contents. The hot sauce tastes fantastically fresh, jam packed with Jalapenos combined with lime and coriander giving an authentic Mexican flavor. This sauce can be used to instantly create a quick salsa by adding a pile of chopped tomatoes. If you can get hold of them try it with tomatillos (mexgrocer.com) for a salsa verde.

Reasonably priced around £3.99 this Green Amigo sauce from the USA will add a fresh zing and Jalapeno chili hit to any dish. If you like your sauces mild and like me cant get enough of jalapenos on you nachos this is well worth a try. Pick up some Mad Dog Green Amigo Hot Sauce from Scorchio by clicking Here

Da Bomb Beyond Insanity Hot sauce Review

Da' Bomb Beyond Insanity is a hot sauce that focuses on purely heat. The bottle claims to be:

"One of the hottest sauces on earth! Pure habanero pepper enhanced with habanero infused flavor create a sauce measured at 119,700 scoville units. Wicked beyond belief!"

There is no doubt that this is a leader of a hot sauce from the USA with a reasonable price tag of arounf £5.50 for a 4oz bottle. The ingredients are quite basic: Habanero peppers, water, natural pepper flavouring, vinegar and spices. but boy do they pack in the Habanero peppers into this hot sauce. For me this sauce lacked flavour but does have a hint of smokiness.

If heat is your thing and you like cool looking hot sauce names in your collection then pick up a bottle of Da' Bomb Beyond Insanity from Scorchio by clicking here or on the bottle.

Enjoy Chilli Heads!

Home Grown 2011: Greenhouse Sensation ChilliGrow Update

Here is a mini update from Greenhouse Sensation Chilligrow experiment. So far I am very pleased with the results. I started with a store bought Hungarian Hot Wax, home grown Jalapeno and finally my Krakatoa chili plant is in its third year picked up from the west dean chilli fiestia which was looking on its last legs. The picture below is from July and as you can see each plant is looking very very healthy. Each plant has fruit and and continues to grow in size week by week.

Greenhouse Sensation Chilligrow Picture

You will also notice in the frame a chilli nasu plant in a pot, I have already eaten the first crop of this one so it is looking a little bear.However I have been adding a little of the water used to fill up the chilli grow each time to this pot with the liquid fertiliser supplied and as a result I have already had a full crop which has already been eaten so currently the plant I looking a little sorry for itself.

Chilli Nasu Plant

If you decide to give the chilli grow yourself check out the Greenhouse sensation site. You can also pick up on the same page the South Devon Chilli Farm's Chilli Starter Kit. This includes everything you need to grow from seed to small plant; 20 Coir compost plugs (peat-free), 100ml of chilli feed, a selection of chilli seeds (3 x packet of seeds - Fresno, Ring of Fire and Peruvian Purple – 60 seeds in all), 10 plant labels and a mini disposable propagator to get seeds off to head start. All this is just £15.

Maddie the Cat taking shade in the Veg Patch

 

CaJohn Select Chilli Purees Fatalii Review

@CajohnFieryFood have produced a fantastic range of select Chili puree products that are very useful for everyday use or to add power and flavour to your cooking.

"CaJohn selects only the finest chiles for his signature line of purees. Ground fresh from the fields, they are blended with distilled vinegar. Citric acid and Vitamin C are added to preserve color, then they are bottled immediately. The result is a minimum of 80% chile solids, more than four times the content of most hot sauces. These purees are wonderful for inclusion in your culinary creations, or sauces of your own design."

The Fatalii is known for it's extreme heat and citrus flavor. Because of such flavor and heat it makes for a unique hot sauce that usually compromises of other citrus flavors like lime and lemon. The walls of the peppers are very thin which makes it very easy to dry. After drying they can be used as powders The Scoville Food Institute lists the Fatalii as the sixth hottest pepper with Scoville units ranging from 125,000 ~ 325,000 units.

I had not tried the Fatalii chilli before and loved this puree, I would relates the taste similar to that of a scotch bonnet or habanero. very fruity and very powerful but very tasty too. Adding this sauce to a chilli con carne woud produce a very unique dish and certainly blow you head off if you add too much.

This puree hot sauce looks more pricey than other sauces but in the bottle you are getting a high concentration of the actual chili pepper so you are in fact getting great value for money and CaJohns has done all the hard work for you compressing a pile of tasty chilli peppers into just one bottle ready for you to use. Click here go to Hot Hedz and pick some up

Or check out some of the other puree hot sauces in the range by clicking one of the links or pictures below to grab some from Scorchio shop where I pick up all my sauces from in the UK.

CaJohn's Select Cayenne Puree

CaJohn's Select Serrano Puree