Extra Ordinary Food: Some like it hot

Ever wonder why spicy foods are so popular in hot areas? It seems counterintuitive, that Central American, Indian and Southeast Asian cuisines are crazy about hot chiles. Capsaicin, the chemical that creates the exciting illusion of burning in your mouth, also triggers the body to sweat, so it cools the body more efficiently. So yeah, hot food keeps you cool. I know it makes no sense on paper, but yeah, that’s life.

I crave hot foods in the summer. In another fit of irony, right when the garden is most bountiful, I also gravitate toward the heavier, rich and thick sauces made from dried chiles. The light, fresh hot sauces like Tabasco just don’t stick to the grilled foods of summer. I want a thick sauce like sriracha, that has a dipping consistency more like ketchup.

To get that consistency, you want to use dried chiles. Fresh hot sauces are just some chiles right off the vine, pureed with a little salt, water and vinegar. Not much to it. Dried chile sauces are a serious rabbit hole that allows for endless variation and very personal, unique options.

At the most basic level, a dried chile sauce also is just chiles, water, vinegar and salt. But that’s about where the similarity stops. There are a staggering amount of different dried chiles, and different ways they can be dried. Many are sun dried. Some are smoked. Some are picked while unripe, others allowed to age to the point where they wilt on the vine. Dried chiles have different names from their fresh counterparts, and can have different names for the drying technique.

Chile sauces also can incorporate other flavors very well, like garlic or onions. Since it will be a thick puree, the garlic or onions don’t need to be liquefied like they would in a Tabasco-style hot sauce. Garlic or onions can be added raw and blended in. You can roast the garlic or caramelize the onions for sweeter savory notes. Or you can use the time honored Mexican technique called Asado.

Asado is a dry roasting technique, typically done on a flat top iron griddle called a comal. It’s best done outdoors in a cast iron pan on a grill, because it can kick up quite a bit of smoke and set the alarms off in your kitchen. Onions are sliced thick and pressed onto the pan with a weight, so they blacken on the surface. And I do mean black, not brown. Garlic is dry-roasted as whole cloves inside their own skin. The paper skins will burn a little bit, and the garlic steams inside. It creates a truly unique garlic flavor.

As I said, there are many different chiles to use, and heirloom varieties and new hybrid chiles are coming to be more commonly available. I'll give a basic rundown of the more common varieties to give you a basic idea of flavor profiles and heat levels of different chiles:

So as you can see, there are a lot of options to choose from. Ancho, Pasilla and Guajillo are often mixed together as the basis for meat sauces like mole, where food is stewed in the sauce like a stew. Hotter chiles like Arbol are often used for isolated bursts of flavor, where a small drizzle or a few drops go on the food.

When choosing chiles at the store, give them a little squeeze in the package. Most chiles should have a little flex to them. If they feel crunchy, stiff, or shatter in the package then they have sat on the shelf too long and gone stale.

There's a lot of ways to blend different chiles together to add more depth. Try mixing a deep savory chile like a Meco with something sweet and fruity like Californias. Make a clean chile sauce with just chiles, water, salt and vinegar to get a clear idea of what that chile tastes like. Add some garlic, onions or both for a fuller, more well rounded and subtle sauce. As always, have fun and don't forget to play with your food.

Don’t forget to take notes when exploring with different variations. Have fun out there, and stay hot.

Chef Tibbs, also known as Joshua “Tibbs” Tibbetts, is a Cedar Rapids native who has been a professional chef for more than 30 years. Reach him at askmrtibbs@gmail.com.