Hot sauce (Recipe: lentils and brown rice)
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It took a trip to Belize to fully convert me to hot sauce use, and now I'm like you -- I like it on an awful lot of food! My favorite is Marie Sharp's, which shows up on every Belizean table. Great stuff, and, thanks to the Internet, now available in the U.S.!
Is there a good guide for the various kinds of hot? It seems as if some hot sauces affect different parts of the mouth and tongue. With some, the hot feeling lasts a while and with others it subsides quickly.
Rupert, the Scoville Unit chart (http://homecooking.about.com/library/weekly/blhotchiles.htm) is a good place to start. The type of pepper in the hot sauce will, in part, govern the heat level of the sauce. And then I guess it's all about your individual sensitivity, like eyes recovering from a flash bulb.
I have a refrigerator in my garage with 30+ hot sauces...different flavors and heat levels. My favorite in the Lentil Soup I make is Fat Cat Caribbean Curry Hot Sauce.