I love hot sauce! OK so this post is largely based on opinion, but I just have to tell everyone how much I love hot sauce. Some of the best combination of foods does not always have to be traditional Mexican or other culturally ethnic hot and spicy foods. Something you will find at almost every breakfast buffet is hot sauce. Hot sauce is great with eggs! Who would have thought?
Another one. This may be a little more obvious but Chicken Wings. I come from an area where hot chicken wings were invented. Western NY, specifically Buffalo NY where my Grandmother was born and raised.
There are many hot sauce recipes for chicken wings but right out of the bottle Franks Redhot Buffalo Chicken is some of the best. There many other brands also competing with this one but I prefer a sauce that is closer to the original buffalo chicken wing.
Just for the record I love hot sauce, but I really don’t like super spicy foods that burn your tongue. A friend of mine once challenged me to eat the hottest wing on the menu at a local wing joint. We did. He talked me into it by saying it will be cool to talk about and say that we did it. We did. I said it will probably ruin our night. It did.
I have included some simple combination of ingredients (so simple I wouldn’t even call them recipes) to give an idea what the boldness of hot sauce ban doo for a meal. Sometimes it’s really nothing more than just dumping it on your food (or on the side like I do).
Best food with hot sauce
1) Burritos
Kitchen Tools
Cooking sheet
Oven / Toaster oven
Can opener
Ingredients
8 Flour tortilla
1 can of refried beans (I will often also add the white rice and black beans as well)
1 pound of cheddar or Mexican blend cheese
Cholula Hot Sauce
Steps
- Heat up refried beans either on the stove or the micro wave but they don’t need to be hot, just warm. You are going to warm them up again.
- Place tortilla on a cooking sheet. You can use corn, gluten free or any other type of tortilla but I prefer flour. Use about two table spoons of refried beans in each tortilla and add about the same amount of cheese.
- Fold one end of the shell over the beans and cheese. Fold the sides inward and roll the rest of the tortilla. Sprinkle with cheese and put in the toaster oven of oven until cheese begins to melt and tortilla begins to turn golden brown.
- Cover with hot sauce.
2) White Rice and Black Beans
Kitchen tools
4 quart sauce pan
Can opener
Large serving spoon
Ingredients
5 Cups of instant white rice
1 can of black beans
½ teaspoon of salt
Dash of black pepper
Cilantro (fresh or dried)
½ stick of butter
Cholula Hot Sauce
Steps
- Combine 5 cups of water with 5 cups of rice (or equal amounts). I use a brand of rice from Aldi. One time I put the rice and water in a pot and walked away for 30 minutes. When I came back it was fluffy and edible. Super Easy.
- Bring to a boil and simmer for 4-5 minutes. Sometimes I don’t even simmer. Foods may cook differently depending on the altitude of where you live.
- Remove from heat and add butter, salt, pepper and cilantro. Let sit for a few minutes until the butter melts and stir.
- Strain and rinse beans and heat until warm. I always drain the starchy liquid from the can and then rinse off a few times as well. This is not a necessary step. You can used dried black beans from a bag but I prefer from a can. I like to heat them separately but you can mix them directly with the rice right out of the can.
- Add beans into rice and stir. Heat until desired temperature. (I hate hot food). Just simmer for a couple of minutes. If you try to heat it up too hot too fast the rice will start to stick.
3) Stir Fry Vegetables
Kitchen Tools
Frying pan or stir fry pan
Spatula or large spoon
Chopping knife or chefs knife. Any knife size will do but the sharper the better.
Ingredients
1 large onion
3 garlic cloves
2 broccoli florets
10 – 12 baby carrots
2 red bell peppers (red for color)
1 package of snap peas
Salt and pepper
2 Tablespoons of oil (vegetable, canola, olive)
Franks Redhot, Crystal or Tabasco®
Steps
- Cut onion, broccoli and peppers into bite size pieces. You can cut the baby carrots or leave them whole but I almost never cut the snap peas. I use the stem of the broccoli as well and will only cut off 1” off the end. I cut there pieces thinner and they may need to be cooked a little longer.
- Peal and mince the garlic. Cover the clove with the end of your chopping knife and smash with the palm of your hand. The garlic will almost remove itself from the skin. Mince (cut into tiny bits) or chop to the desired size. I like a lot of garlic.
- Set frying pan to medium temperature and add oil, garlic and carrots. A stir fry pan works great but any large non stick frying pan will work. Cook for 4 to 6 minutes stirring the mixture frequently as the garlic will begin to brown quickly. I like the carrots cooked slightly more than the rest of the ingredients as well as the broccoli stems (if you are using them).
- Add onions, broccoli, peppers and snap peas and salt & pepper.
- Turn up to medium high and continue to stir contents as they cook for 5 to 7 minutes.
- Add hot sauce.
4) Chicken Wings
Kitchen tools
Frying pan or deep skillet is fine. If you have a deep fryer that works great but is not necessary.
Tongs, long fork or anything from grabbing hot wings out of oil.
Paper towel
2 – 2 quart size plastic bag (one inside the other)
Ingredients
1 package of frozen of fresh chicken wings. They are usually sold by the pound but I never cook more that 8 to 10 wings at a time. Once the oil heats up they cook very fast and so the first couple of batches will still be warm when you are done. Or keep them warm in the oven.
Oil. I use about a half a quart of vegetable oil and always reuse it again several times for cooking. You can strain into another plastic bottle after it cools or any other container you have in the refrigerator.
Franks Redhot Buffalo Wings
Steps
- Fill frying pan with about ½ of cooking oil or enough so at least half of a chicken wing is submerged at a time.
- Cook for 3 to 4 minutes each side
- Remove with tongs and place on a paper towel on a plate. I will sometimes use paper grocery bags or other paper products to absorb any of the residual oils but these can be dirty so its usually the last resort.
- Let cool under a minute but add sauce when they are warm.
- You can dump the sauce on them directly but I like to put them in a plastic bag, cover them with sauce and seal the bag. Shake them until the sauce has covered all the wings.
5) Spicy Greens
Kitchen Tools
Large frying pan. Deep pan or Texas skillet work best.
Chopping knife or chefs knife
Measuring cup
Ingredients
1 bundle of collard greens
½ pound of bacon
1 large onion
1 cup apple cider vinegar
1 cup chicken broth
Salt
Tabasco®. You really do not need much more than a couple of teaspoons but be conservative if you are serving to guests.
Steps
- Cook bacon and remove from pan. Cut the bacon into smaller than bite size pieces. The bacon adds a lot of flavor and the smaller pieces will go further through the dish. Leave some, not all of the bacon grease.
- Cook onion in the pan with bacon grease.
- Cut stems off of greens and cut into large pieces. Add to pan with opinion, vinegar, Tabasco and broth.
- Cook on low until greens begin to wilt turning them occasionally.
- Add additional hot sauce as needed.
Other great foods with hot sauce
6) Eggs
Eggs? The first time I heard of someone putting hot sauce on their eggs was my sister who was living in New Mexico at the time.
There are many ways to cook eggs but fried or scrambled are the best with hot sauce. I almost always have a side of toast and breakfast sausage, but the eggs alone will provide a good amount of protein. A dash of hot sauce will spice things up.
7) OMG! Bagels and cream cheese with Sriracha!
It’s the hot sauce cream cheese combination that just knocked my socks off! I have mixed other hot sauces with cream cheese but I think it is the sweetness of the sriracha that completes it.
8) Hamburgers and hot dogs come alive!
Off the grill of coarse. Again I love sriracha with my hamburgers and its even better with a little sweet relish. No wonder this condiment is slowly becoming number one over ketchup and mustard?
9) Pizza with ricotta cheese!
This reminds me of one of my first hot sauce experiences on a pizza from a joint called Bonzai Pizza in Syracuse NY. They used a sweet tomato sauce that offered plenty of heat. Today I like to put it on any cheese pizza.
On the back of Franks Redhot label it says “I put this sh*t on everything”. I don’t. I do love it to spice up an otherwise bland meal (to me). If you have a new hot sauce variety or brand that you have never had before always put some on the side. Due to the bold spiciness of hot sauce I never need a large amount to enhance my meal but it doesn’t take much and there are many, many different hot sauce flavors available.
