Spicy vinegar

[Steve H]

Steve, I don't know how I missed this originally, but my wife loves pepper vinegar on greens and cabbage. I like it too, but just not as much as my wife. So now I'll be on the hunt for the peppers which may be difficult to find. Thanks...

You can use the dried ones as well. Just doesn't look as pretty!

Amazon.com : Authentic Red Thai Chili Peppers, 5 oz. Bag, Genuine Hot Red Whole Pepper Chilis, Dried Fresh for Cooking Traditional Asian Foods, Soups, and Curry by Amazing Chiles & Spices : Grocery & Gourmet Food

 

[Steve H]

Im thinking a big bowl of beans and cornbread with a shot of that would be good.
Jim

Yup! Kielbasa with either turnip or collard greens is excellent with this. Also great on spinach.

 

[chopsaw]

Old thread , but interested in doing some of this . Found some info on the net , and made up a bottle from some dried Tabasco peppers I grew a few years ago .
I couldn't find any info here , so I reached out to Steve . He was good enough to reply and get me the link to this thread , and I didn't even have to buy anything !!! At least not yet .
Deserves a bump anyway . This stuff is pretty good . I did PP a couple days ago , and gave my sandwich a few shakes . Really good .
Peppers are still hydrating in this pic . They're nice and plumed back up now . Heat is perfect .

 

[jcam222]

Old thread , but interested in doing some of this . Found some info on the net , and made up a bottle from some dried Tabasco peppers I grew a few years ago .
I couldn't find any info here , so I reached out to Steve . He was good enough to reply and get me the link to this thread , and I didn't even have to buy anything !!! At least not yet .
Deserves a bump anyway . This stuff is pretty good . I did PP a couple days ago , and gave my sandwich a few shakes . Really good .
Peppers are still hydrating in this pic . They're nice and plumed back up now . Heat is perfect .
View attachment 722991

Good stuff!! I made a,few bottles with the Tabasco peppers I grew last year.

 

[chopsaw]

Good stuff!!

It's awesome . I put it on that pulled pork , and it was great .
You leave yours on the table or fridge ?

 

[jcam222]

It's awesome . I put it on that pulled pork , and it was great .
You leave yours on the table or fridge ?

Fridge just in case

 

[1MoreFord]

It's awesome . I put it on that pulled pork , and it was great .
You leave yours on the table or fridge ?

Just leave it out on the table. If you can leave ketchup out this stuff is even safer.
Folks at home and restaurants down here in the South have been doing it for generations.
BTW, I have a jar of Trappys sliced japs and the vinegar from it is even more flavorful than what is made with cayennes.
Tabascos work about like cayennes if you have any of them.
Using pepper sauce, as my family has always called it, would likely be a killer base to use making Eastern NC BBQ Sauce. Never have tried it though because until I saw you mention it on pulled pork I'd never thought of it.

 

[1MoreFord]

Im thinking a big bowl of beans and cornbread with a shot of that would be good.
Jim

Strangely, I've never tried it with beans but it's great with peas.

 

[chopsaw]

Just leave it out on the table.

Yup . That's what I did . See it on the table all the time at restaurants . I can see people weigh on the side of caution though .

Tabascos work about like cayennes if you have any of them.

I used dried Tabasco for this , but have a cayenne plant growing now , that's giving a great yield so far . Going to make powder from that , but might sneak one is a jar . I have some Serrano's too , that are pretty spicy .
This was great on the pork just as is .

 

[zwiller]

I need to try this! I have been looking for an excuse to play with SV extraction. I want to try making some german style herb vinegar and may be vanilla (pickled eggs?). Anyhow some found some REALLY good info on Reddit to pass along if anyone into the SV idea.

SNIP
Hi! I have some experience with this both in a food chemistry lab and as an amateur chef/cocktail creator. Sous vide and/or heat in general absolutely speeds up solvent extractions. The answer is unequivocally yes.
Here are the caveats:

• Do not use plastic or vacuum sealing bags with anything but water and water-based foods. Solvents, including ethanol, dramatically increase the propensity to pull "bad" things out of plastics that are otherwise safe for Sous Vide (e.g. polyethylene).
• Use glass or silicone exclusively when doing solvent extracts with any organic solvent. Organic solvents are things like: ethanol, olive oil, vegetable oil, hexane, butane, propane, propanol, etc.. Butane and Hexane are widely used to make cannabis extracts by the way, if you're wondering at their inclusion here. They are not safe to eat and are removed with vacuum distillation afterwards. You can ignore that part if it's completely outside of your area of interest.
• If you're making botanical extracts for cooking/cocktails, use glass as your extraction vessel and use a high-grade ethanol, not moonshine. I'm a big fan of Extractahol - they have a clean product if you can't find something locally.
• The temperature matters. Too hot, and you can hit a threshold at which additional, undesirable things are able to solvate suddenly and extract when they couldn't at lower temperatures. This can be things like bitter catechins in woody herbs, or unpleasant tasting pigments in some flowers, things like that.
• For citrus and "delicate" extractions, I wouldn't go above 130 F. Bear in mind this could be a danger zone for bacteria if the pH isn't low (it should be low in a citrus extract).
• For oil-based and large molecule extractions, all the way up to 160 F is fair game. 180 is the absolute max I would ever go, and only in oil.
• For quick-and-dirty flavor extractions in water and/or ethanol, 145 is my default temp. This is a bacterially food-safe temp for long-term extraction.

Since these are diffusion extractions, they all follow basic non-linear reaction law (Arrhenius equation). This means that for every 10 C or ~17 F, the reaction rate doubles. Specifically, if we use 72F as "room temp" and a baseline, if an extraction takes 6 weeks/42 days at room temp, it would take ~8 days at 145 F. In practice though, based on personal experience, I don't think any extractions take longer than 2-4 weeks at room temp, and rarely longer than 3 days in a Sous Vide bath. But the preceding law (doubling of rate every 10 degrees C) can help you figure out the time savings and/or approximate time needed to fully extract.
Lastly, any kind of periodic gentle stirring or shaking will also dramatically speed up the process. It needn't be (and shouldn't be!!) vigorous or constant. In labs, a shaker table (on which the whole sous vide bath resides), magnetic stir plates, low energy microwaves, and ultrasonic agitators are all used for this and all work quite well. I'm a fan of ultrasonic agitators running on a periodic schedule (3 minutes every hour or something like that). Again, don't be aggressive with this or you'll over-extract other stuff.

 

[Fueling Around]

Great thread. I haven’t made infused vinegar in years
Thanks for the bump chopsaw

I used to frequent a fish and chips shop in Seattle and they had infused malt vinegar

Thanks for big post zwiller

 

[frankie007]

Those look great, good work. I use scotch bonnet peppers and slice them. I leave mine in the cupboard out of the sun. It is a staple in our house as it has so many uses

 

[Steve H]

Strangely, I've never tried it with beans but it's great with peas.

It's great on beans, asparagus, and brussel sprouts!

 

[912smoker]

We use it mainly on cabbage and greens.
Hard to eat them without it.

Keith

 

[sandyut]

Good stuff! We buy Trappey's but making it at home would be fun and likely cost much less as no in CO carries Trappeys

 

[1MoreFord]

Something that's just as good that some of you may have around already is the vinegar out of jars of sliced jalapenos. It's a bit stronger than the cayenne/tabasco versions but still great.

 

[Steve H]

Something that's just as good that some of you may have around already is the vinegar out of jars of sliced jalapenos. It's a bit stronger than the cayenne/tabasco versions but still great.

Shoot! I drink that stuff straight up! Along with pickle juice, banna peppers,etc.

 

[Steve H]

Saturday I put a lone poblano pepper I had laying in the fridge. Sliced into a quart of vinegar. Just tested it. It is very good! Another pepper to use for spicy vinegar.