[Sca-cooks] OT: on a tangential note -- "Chili Sauce"

[ysabeau]

I've seen many variations of chili sauce. There is the chili sauce 
that is used in Asian recipes as either a condiment or an 
ingredient. I had something called Chili Crabs in Malaysia or 
Singapore that seemed to be crabs cooked in a 
tomato/chili/barbecue sauce. It was delicious and similar to a 
Cuban recipe that my mom used to make called Crab Shalau (phonetic 
spelling because I have no idea how to spell it). She made it by 
cooking crabs in a combination spaghetti and barbecue sauce (about 
half and half of the jarred variety, you'd be surprised). It would 
be served with spaghetti, garlic bread, and a salad. With crabs in 
the shell, we would cover an outdoor table with newspaper and 
spend a couple of hours sitting and eating (picking crabmeat out 
of the shells is a time consuming process). The easy version is to 
put crabmeat in the sauce and serve over spaghetti. 

I also saw in Germany, that they have a lot of ketchup variations -
 curry ketchup (delicious on fries), chili ketchup, tomato 
ketchup, etc. The ketchup section at the grocery store was almost 
as big as the salad dressing section is over here. They also sold 
tuna fish in cans with chile sauce instead of oil or water. I 
never tried it...It looked to be a tomato based sauce. I have 
since seen a recipe that makes me think that the tuna thing might 
be based on a traditional north African dish. 

As for Frito Pie...it is one of the true delicacies of the world. 
I can't go to a football game without getting Frito Pie. Even when 
I was in Singapore, we had Frito Pie at the games. 

BTW, if anyone has a source for curry ketchup, I would love to 
hear about it!

Thanks,
Ysabeau


---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
From: Bill Fisher <liamfisher at gmail.com>
Reply-To: Bill Fisher <liamfisher at gmail.com>,
Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2005 09:58:04 -0500

>On Thu, 27 Jan 2005 06:06:15 -0500, Phil Troy / G. Tacitus 
Adamantius
><adamantius.magister at verizon.net> wrote:
>> Hullo, the list!
>> 
>> Does anyone have any insight to offer, since we've been 
speculating a
>> bit about various alleged chili preparations, exactly what is 
the
>> provenance and purpose of bottled "chili sauce"? I suspect the
>> non-Americans on this list may not know the substance to which I
>> refer...
>
>I come from the land of Heinz......Heinz Chili Sauce is primarily 
a hot dog and
>burger condiment.  I grew up in the stuff  'cause my parents 
couldn't
>get me to eat catsup after I developed a dislike for catsup in my 
childhood.
>
>Like all other heinz products, it has been subverted to other 
recipes
>and such over the years.  I've seen it used to make sloppy joes, 
etc.
>
>It's good on scrambled eggs as well, especially in a diner.  It's 
a great
>way to mask overcooked eggs, or add to eggs as you are scrambling.
>
>> Someone mentioned a sauce added to "chili", and said it was 
like a
>> thin, watered-down, sweet ketchup. Could that have been chili 
sauce,
>> such as people like Heinz make? I've never actually tried the 
stuff,
>> as far as I know, but occasionally note its existence on 
supermarket
>> shelves, and am always amused by the fact that, so far from 
having
>> chillies as a primary ingredient, it actually contains none, as 
a
>> rule.
>
>Heinz has a habit of listing any "secret ingredients" as "natural 
flavorings."
>
>This covers any herbs and spices they do not want to disclose, 
including 
>chilis and herb.  
>
>I think it has some cayenne pepper in it, just a trace.
>
>I've never heard of it being added to chili ever.
>
>
>> Apparently, though, this stuff is a traditional main ingredient 
in
>> the red cocktail sauce you sometimes find served with cold 
seafoods
>> in the US, although by the time the requisite lemon, 
Worcestershire,
>> and horseradish (plus optional Tabasco) are added, the absence 
of
>> chili in the chili sauce is less glaring.
>
>Yep, this is true.  It is a staple in it.
>
>> It's interesting, though, that in a way we've sort of come full
>> circle here: the special steak sauce from the Old New York (even
>> better: Old Brooklyn) steak house, Peter Luger's, that great 
temple
>> to cholesterol whose waiters have been insulting customers and
>> refusing to honor checks and credit cards, other than their own 
Peter
>> Luger's credit card, for well over a hundred years (having a 
Peter
>> Luger credit card is a sign you have made it in New York, not 
that
>> you can do anything else with it but buy a meal at Peter 
Luger's) --
>> their steak sauce, which you can now buy in bottles, is a thin,
>> tomato-based (but apparently not ketchup-based) sauce that 
seems to
>> contain crushed tomatoes, maybe molasses or some other 
sweetener like
>> corn syrup, just a little vinegar, grated horseradish and some 
other,
>> unnamed spices. It is sold refrigerated in glass bottles, but 
is used
>> in the restaurant as a salad dressing, with their beefsteak 
tomato
>> and bermuda onion appetizer (I guess this is really a salad), a 
steak
>> sauce, and with cold seafood cocktails. In that context it's 
actually
>> quite good stuff.
>
>Sounds good actually.  
>
>
>> I was just wondering whether there was any connection to this
>> mysterious bottled chililess chili sauce. Apart from seafood 
cocktail
>> sauce, what is chili sauce of the Heinz variety used for? Or 
are you
>> supposed to put it on chili?
>> 
>> Adamantius
>
>Just another condiment my friend.  Mostly to mix with other 
things to 
>make the condiments.  A "different" catsup.
>
>
>Cadoc
>
>-- 
>
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about it" -
>                                    - William Gibson
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