FAQ - Product & Operations

Like all who enjoy food, we each have those special tastes that we enjoy..  So I began my recipe development by combining the things I would like in a sauce.  I also did a lot of research about the different styles of sauce that are on the market.  Regardless of my affection for highly vinegar sauces, I know that the heavy vinegar Louisiana style of sauce is very popular,  so I made my best attempt at that style.  I spent a lot of time (and money) purchasing various sauces for taste tasting.  I tried hard to identify what made their taste.   I also got ideas from the sauce social media site I frequent, from reviews of other sauces, and from videos and articles about formulas that work.   But mostly, I did an awful lot of sauce making, tasting, refining, tasting some more, and trying to come up with that combination that worked.  Sauce recipes are really just trial and error.  For every 10 or 12 recipes I tried, I came up with maybe one that deserved further refinement.

We plan to have a core recipe line-up that includes 10 to 14 sauces.  These sauces will be available year-round.  In addition, at any given time, we may have one or more limited-availability, single batch sauces that result from our recipe testing.  Should these sauces prove to have wide interest, they would be moved to the core offerings group.  There could also be special seasonal sauces available during certain parts of the year.

No.  Our mission from the beginning was to make sauces that compliment the food items in which they are used.  We are not going to be one of those sauce companies that strive to make the hottest possible sauces, made especially for their heat "shock" value.  Our sauces will range from sweet, to mild, hot, and blazing hot.  There will be a variety to ensure that every potential user can find a sauce that suits their taste and heat tolerance.

We certainly intend to have adequate inventory of all of the core sauce items in stock for immediate delivery to satisfy orders.  The source pepper pods themselves are very seasonal, and production schedules sometimes run afoul .  Of course, limited-availability sauces and seasonal sauces will come and go.

Our pourable hot sauces are available in 5 ounce bottles.  These bottles are shaped in the famous "woozy" style, a bottle design made especially for hot sauces and liquids that might need dose limiters.  This bottle style also have a very small area that the top of the sauce to limit damage to the contents due to oxidation.  Our other products, such as pepper pastes, honey products, mustards, and other specialty products come in a variety of other containers, with volumes from 4 ounces to 16 ounces.  We also have raw fermented pepper mash and pepper purees in one gallon pails. 

Most of our sauces are fermented, which results in a very acid base product.  Products with high natural acid levels offer potentially unlimited shelf life.  Foods with a pH of 4.6 or less offer the safest shelf life of all foods.  Some of our cooked or smoked sauces are not fermented, but are acidified during processing to provide the same protection.

Low pH foods, like our sauces, are known to have very long shelf life.  Safety is assured for up to 4 years.  Even when opened, acidified foods should remain shelf stable.  Many people continue to store open hot sauces on the shelf.  We think that if you consume your bottle slowly, refrigeration after opening might be warranted.

We DO NOT process food under Alabama Cottage Food laws.  All Alabama Hot Sauce products are produced in our commercial kitchen, following all laws and regulations of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).  Every recipe we produce is subjected to an outside review by an individual who is recognized by the FDA as a "food process authority" for suitability for market, processing and packaging procedures, heat treatment steps to assure shelf stability, and label structure and contents.  In addition, our commercial kitchen is inspected by the Alabama Department of Agriculture every three months, and our processes are subject to FDA review on an annual basis.

Absolutely!  All food items sold in the United States must be produced as defined by their Process Authority document, a detailed blueprint of ingredients, quality assurance plans, and process steps  For each recipe, samples of the product are submitted to a certified food engineering and testing lab for evaluation.  In our case, our process authority consultants are associated with the Food Science and Engineering Department at North Carolina State   University.  In addition to samples, we submit a detailed recipe, recipe scaling formulas, a detailed step-by-step description of the entire process, the quality control plan for the product, and detailed bottling, packaging, and storage steps for the product.  Most important, the process authority evaluates our heat treatment process for all foods to ensure that they will last, on the shelf, for the length of time necessary. In addition, we submit a detailed plan for product recall and tracing should that become necessary.

The vast majority of our sauces will be fermented.  To be exact, they will be lacto-fermented using both wild and cultured lactobacillus  cultures.  Fermenting is not only one of the safest ways to preserve food, but it imparts a depth of taste that simply  cannot be achieved in any other way.  We prefer an even better way of fermenting known as vacuum fermentation.  This results in the mechanical removal of all oxygen instead of waiting several days for the fermentation process to naturally drive the oxygen out by replacing it with carbon dioxide gas.

Several of our sauces will be raw, cooked, or smoked as the preferred method of processing.  While fermentation lowers the pH of the sauce through cell conversion, these three types of sauce will be acidified mechanically by addition of high-acid food ingredients. 

Yes they are. The issue of pasteurization of hot sauces is a hot topic among home sauce makers, fermenters, and users of fermented sauces.  Fermentation produces a high level of probiotic activity.  The latest information about probiotics makes it clear that our health can improve with the consumption of probiotic cultures.  Unfortunately, pasteurization destroys the probiotics in the food.

We believe sincerely that bottled hot sauces should be pasteurized.  When produced and sold commercially, we think pasteurization is essential.  We believe there are four important reasons for pasteurization of sauces.

1.  Pasteurization completely stops the fermentation process.  It kills the lactobacillus  cultures that cause fermentation to occur.  Without pasteurization, the fermentation  process would continue in the sealed sauce bottle, releasing carbon dioxide which continually increases pressure in the bottle.  When the bottle is highly pressurized,  opening the bottle could result in hot sauce squirting out of the bottle like hot lava, splashing on the ceiling and floors and the poor soul holding the bottle.  (Think of opening a cola that is well shaken)  In the worst of cases, the continued fermentation could result in a "bottle bomb."  This occurs when pressure builds high, causing the bottle to explode.  This is not only dangerous, but the clean-up is an exercise out of hell.

2.  Pasteurization seals the flavor profile of the sauce.  If fermentation continues in the bottle, the flavor profile of the sauce continues to migrate as a result of the increased aging of the sauce.  As pressure builds, there is a noticeable increase in the "fizz" nature of the sauce, resulting in taste changes.  When we make a hot sauce, we want to be in control of the taste profile.  When you buy a hot sauce, you want it to taste the same from day to day, bottle to bottle, year to year.  Anything else would be chaos.

3.  Pasteurization makes the hot sauce safer and more shelf stable,  For our products, we bring the sauce to a temperature of 195F for five minutes.  Not only are the  lactobacillus cultures killed as mentioned above, but ALL organisms in the sauce are killed., including the really dangerous ones (if they should be present) we hear about in the news.  In addition, the sauce is put in the bottles at this high temperature {hot-filling}. Even though the bottles and closures have been washed, sanitized, and chemically sterilized in previous parts of the process, the introduction of this hot liquid in the bottles kills anything that could have possibly survived the previous cleaning, sanitizing, and sterilization steps.

4.  The hot-filling process that follows pasteurization allows the expanded sauce to be filled to the level brim of the bottle thread finish.  This leaves no room for oxygen, the most dangerous gas for growth of bacteria.  Since the bottle is immediately tightly capped while the liquid is hot, a vacuum is drawn in the oxygen-free bottle.  The result is a sealed, low pH, sterile container.  This represents one of the safest food package processes available.

We will have an aggressive schedule of farmers markets and pop-up sales locations throughout the spring and summer in north Alabama.  In addition, our sauces are available for sale on our ecommerce website at alabamahotsauce.com.  We also have purchase opportunities on all of the social media sites.  

Yes we do.  For all orders $45 (not including sales tax and over, we provide free USPS Priority Mail service.  For orders less than $45.00. we ship your order for a flat rate of $8.50.  For  certain specialty products, free shipping may not be available.  For those products, it will be clearly noted on the product page before you make your purchase.

Shipping for wholesale orders, special bulk orders, and rush shipping for any orders will be billed to the customer based on our individual, mutual agreement.

If you find any product purchased from us to be damaged, defective, or shipped in error, replacement will be arranged if we are notified within 30 days of purchase.   Due to state laws in Alabama, we are unable to accept returns of food items, so at the time of replacement we may ask you to dispose of the incorrect or damaged item.