This Chilli Sauce Is So Hot Right Now
Last year, I was introduced to a chilli sauce that changed my life. In fact, I was introduced to a chilli sauce that changed my life twice. First for the better and then for the much, much worse.
Now, I can’t divulge the name of this chilli sauce because I would be breaking a solemn vow between my friends to keep it a secret, which is wholly unfair and faintly ridiculous, but a pact is a pact. All I can say is that it is the perfect blend of texture and spice and I made the indulgent error of adding it to every meal. A little at first, and just on the things chilli sauce usually goes on, but the dosage gradually grew, and before long I was piling it on everything. I would purposefully skew my meal choices to allow for maximum sauce appreciation; food was less about taste and more about serving as a vessel for the sauce. I was a junkie. I needed help.
A post shared by Eaten Alive (@eatenaliveldn) on Jun 17, 2020 at 2:45pm PDT
In January, after a period of delicious but ultimately spiceless Christmas food, I returned to London jonesing for my capsaicin crutch. I had recently perfected my technique for boiling eggs to the perfect ‘jammy’ consistency for ramen, so that was the plan. A big bowl of chewy satay noodles and a mountain of chilli sauce. I dined freely, and as the cumulative fire lingered on my lips, a wave of satisfaction washed over me. But something wasn’t right, some ingredient had not fared well over the yuletide slump, and that night at 3am, the redemptive noodles struck me down. The cruellest betrayal – poisoned by the one I loved most.
I still can’t be sure which component was to blame, but the damage – widespread and indiscriminate – had been done. Just the thought of that chilli sauce – and ramen, and perfectly jammy eggs – made me wretch, and still does to this day.
For the past seven months I have been lost in a hinterland of culinary confusion, at once desperate for a fiery condimental hit and physically repulsed at the very thought of it.
But now, life is sweet – and hot, and smoky and lip-smacking – once again.
Last week, whilst browsing the tastefully shabby shelves of a bijoux delicatessen in Battersea, I came upon a bottle of Eaten Alive’s Smoked Sriracha Fermented Hot Sauce. It cried out to me. Could this be the elixir to ease me (and my cautious bowels) back into the chilli game? A week later, having finished the bottle, I can simply say, "yes, chef".
A post shared by Eaten Alive (@eatenaliveldn) on Jul 9, 2020 at 1:29pm PDT
I know Huy Fong sriracha, I like Huy Fong sriracha, and I understand the global obsession with Huy Fong sriracha – the California factory makes around 20 million bottles a year – but it’s just a bit straightforward for me. I am likely a snob, but I think it’s base level. Nothing more than a gateway sauce. Your true chilli sauce fiend demands something more potent. Eaten Alive, based in Wandsworth, southwest London, oak-smokes the peppers before mixing them with garlic and salt and letting them ferment for several months. The result is sweet, rich, deep in flavour and warmly spicy. It’s not hot hot, but there’s enough chilli to wake you up.
Eaten Alive's small but varied range of fermented products – including pink sauerkraut, golden kimchi and scotch bonnet sauce – utilises the transformative effects of bacteria to take flavours and intensify them. If the results are always this good, I don't understand why we haven't been fermenting everything, all the time. Who knows how long this love affair will last, but for now, I’m smitten.
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