"Flame Thrower" Habanero Hot Sauce (and chickens)

In the fall, I like to use up the last of my hot peppers and make a hot sauce to give as gifts.  This year our chocolate habanero plant was extremely prolific and since that fruity, hot, hot pepper is one of my favorites, habanero hot sauce was on the menu.  Hot peppers will stay fresh for awhile if you keep them bagged in the fridge.  I didn't exactly follow a recipe for this batch, but I did pH test it, and it is vinegar based with a pH of around 3.7 so it should keep well in the fridge for quite awhile. My previous vinegar sauces were fine for over a year.  I ordered the bottles from Fillmore Container...website can be found here.

I used roughly:

big bag of carrots

1 quart of canned whole tomatoes

onions, a lot (I cant remember how many!  Maybe 10 or so?)

50 habaneros

3 c vinegar

1 c lime juice

1.5 c water

salt to taste

Chop onions and carrots and cook in oil until tender. Add tomatoes and simmer.  Make a paste with habaneros in food processor with some liquid.  Combine everything except lime juice.  Blend well with immersion blender.  Heat through and barely simmer for 20 minutes.  Add lime juice, put through a food mill, and bottle.  

Habanero Hot Sauce

Fancy "taped on" label

In other news the chickens are getting into the holiday spirit by kicking around some evergreen bough trimmings we picked up from a christmas tree seller.  These are woody and will not be breaking down anytime soon but they are a nice bulky, airy bottom to this giant compost pile I'm building for chicken winter entertainment and soil conservation.

Compost Beginnings

Getting into the Holiday Spirit with some evergreen boughs