Chile pepper could aid weight loss

The back story: With the seasonal harvest of chile peppers under way, it seemed appropriate to revisit the pepper’s reputation as a weight-loss aid. Claims of medicinal properties of chile peppers have circulated for years. The reported benefits have included everything from easing arthritis pain to lowering cholesterol. In 2002, Heidi Allison promoted the use of the Southwest staple for the diet conscious in her book The Chili Pepper Diet.

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Hey…we know this guy!

Sixteenth Annual Austin Chronicle Hot Sauce Contest Winners - we’re happy for all of them, but especially:

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A word about some other goings-on from ZestFest 2006:

OUR TEAM IS RED-HOT

ZestFest 2006 cooks up scholarship competition for local colleges

Fort Worth, TX – The Fort Worth Culinary Institute vs. Tarrant County Community College is sure to heat up ZestFest 2006, at the Will Rogers Center in Fort Worth on September 9th and 10th. For the first time in its five year run Zest Fest will have a zesty cooking challenge between teams from the two schools. The champion will take home a book scholarship from ZestFest sponsor Chile Pepper Magazine. The competition is slated to take place Saturday afternoon, September 9th, 2006, at 2:00 pm, and will be judged by super hot celebrity chefs and zesty fest goers alike.

In addition to the competition, a stellar line up of celebrity chefs will be in attendance to engage ZestFest crowds, as well as provide cooking demos utilizing the bold flavorings fancied by fans of hot cooking. A myriad of heavy hitters such as PBS’s Rick Browne; host and creator of Barbecue America, as well as author of several cookbooks; with bring his big BBQ style to the fest this year, as well as Chef Bill Wavrin. Gourmet Magazine said, “his salsas are positively addictive” and he is also considered one of the worlds top spa chefs….a leader in the field of eating for wellness. His latest cookbook in conjunction with Rancho La Puerta is a James Beard Foundation Award nominated tome, and the spa was named the #1 Spa cuisine by Conde Nast Traveller Magazine during his ten year reign as Executive Chef.

Other notable chefs include the “Tapas Guru” and Latin cuisine expert Hector Santiago, of the top Atlanta restaurant Pura Vida. Originally from Puerto Rico, this Culinary Institute of America graduate has been in the scene of Atlanta with his family owned restaurant. Long considered an expert on the usage of chili and spices, his latin influenced and creative approach to tapas has put him at the top of the list with a win as Restaurant of the Year 2005 from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

ZestFest is a showcase for those who not only enjoy the spice of life, but those who have the hottest and zestiest products on the market. This is an opportunity to put their wares in front of not only the consumer, but also those in the industry. From retail buyers to restaurants it is the largest gathering of salsa in the world, and quite possibly the hottest collection of heat inspired items on the planet. A sizzling connoisseurs sampling opportunity of a lifetime!

Tickets will be sold at the door Sept. 9 -10 to general public and admission is $10, which includes tastings, entertainment, as well as all the cooking demos. Children four and under are free.

Chile Pepper magazine

Chile Pepper magazine, host of Zest Fest and the Fiery Food Challenge, publishes six issues per year full of the latest flavorful products, restaurants, recipes, events and celebrity chefs— from barbecue to chili and from Thai to Italian. Leaders in the cult of all things hot, Chile Pepper Magazine pursues the purists as well as the curious, unveiling everything from the history of the chili pepper to recipes for zestful desserts. Founded in 1987, what started as a little newsletter in New Mexico has become a leading publication for the followers of all that screams spicy. Zesty, spicy cooking is hotter than ever and getting hotter – Chile Pepper Magazine, its shows and website have been and will continue to be the leaders of this movement!

All I can say is bless my mom’s heart. The day I arrived in Cleveland to visit her (Heidi) and dad (Richard), she immediately whisked me away to Legacy Village in Lyndhurst, Ohio. There it was, Heather’s Heat and Flavor! I walked directly up to co-owner, Brian Marx, and introduced myself as a fellow chili-head. We immediately hit it off. He gave me the grand tour of the shop (read: he stood behind the counter and pointed at things with his laser pointer).

They have a vast collection of chip dips, BBQ sauces, rubs, over 100 different kinds of hot sauces, collectable and much more! Even more impressive is their collection of spices and dried peppers, including their own brand of blends, which include “Brian’s Cajun Blend” and “Brian’s Chili Powder”.

Brian and I then spent a good ten minutes bantering back and forth about chili peppers and hot sauces. He kept feeding me samples (on toothpicks) of sauces and testing my heat tolerance. One of the first things he gave me was a pin sized drop of the 7.1 million SHU extract sauce that is known as… The Source. After about the fifth sauce sampler, Brian’s assistant, who was now very wide eyed, exclaimed, “WOW! You just put the whole toothpick in you mouth ever time! You don’t test for the heat level first, you go all out!” To which I grinned and retorted, “Never fear the heat, embrace it.”

Overall, I was extremely impressed with this store. The co-owner, Brian, was extremely knowledgeable of ALL of his product and of most things hot. He’ll point you in the right direction, give you suggestions of what to put certain sauces on, and hand out easy to do recipes (I am looking forward to making the Hallowevil Pumpkin Pie). You can visit Brian and Heather in the Legacy Village location at; 24687 Cedar Road, Lyndhurst, Ohio 44124. Or you can visit Brian’s mom at the First and Main location; 94 First Street, Hudson, Ohio 44236. Be sure to tell them Jon from The Hot Zone Online sent ya!

As a former resident of Bradenton, Florida, I was a little nostalgic to see such a great new hot sauce shop doing good business there. John Martell’s Hot Shot Pepper Emporium is only a few miles from where I used to live, and we’ll definitely stop in on our next trip to the ol’ hometown…whenever that happens to be. For now, here’s the article, which admittedly is a little older now than when it was first published:

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Great article featuring the siling labuyo chile, which we had never heard of before now. This chile is actually from Capsicum frutescens, the same as a Rocoto chile…although the siling labuyo looks like a miniature cayenne pepper. From the Manila Bulletin Online, we found this article which you may find interesting if only for the historical perspective of chile peppers in the Phillipines.

When she was still a child, superstar Nora Aunor once said, they would prop the labuyo chili before they did the house whenever a storm was coming. Such is the reverence of Filipinos for the unassuming yet fiery siling labuyo.

Click here for the rest of the article

Our main source of forum discussion for the world of hot & spicy, TheHotPepper, has undergone a much-needed overhaul, face-lift, or whatever you want to call it. Feel free to go there to get involved in discussions of hot sauces, chile peppers, chili, BBQ, recipes, selling/buying, or even free-for-all discussion area that can be as thought-provoking as interesting.

Some of the authors from this blog are there as well and we don’t bite…hard.

Here’s a really great article about some of the hot sauce & salsa offerings in and around the Austin, Texas area:

Hot-saucy legends get fired up for the festival

Much of this is a prelude to the Austin Chronicle Hot Sauce Festival, which is happening this coming weekend on August 27…which just happens to be Joe’s birthday!! (Hey Chuk, Joe wants more hot sauce for his b-day…maybe you can set a brutha up. LOL!)

This is yet another “exotic” offering from the folks at Peppermaster. It’s hard to know what’s more impressive…the sauce recipes they come up with or how good they get them to taste. With this sauce’s name, I didn’t know where to begin with using it. The contents of the jar included:

Ingredients: apple cider, peppers, ginger, plums, orange, garlic, tamari, rice vinegar, sherry, cornstarch, sesame oil, spices, black beans, herbs, sea salt, guar

Tasting a little on my finger, I was again stunned at the uniqueness of the taste. Like my review of the BBQ Thai Satay, I needed a little direction on what I might try this sauce upon. What I could tell for sure from my little taste was that the heat was definitely ratcheted up a notch for this sauce compared to the last. The view from the top looked like this:

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As many of you know, the Hot Sauce Blog is (and has been) down. While Nick claims that there are “technical difficulties” with hosting…let’s all be realistic here. We know that there’s something else at work that’s depriving his minions of chileheads their daily fix.

We’re not conspiracy theorists, mind you, but we have some notions as to why the site is really not working. In David Letterman “Top Ten” format, they are:

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