Hi All,
I started a hot sauce company with my Fiancee earlier this year. Ever since we meet we shared a great common interest, we both loved to cook. We both grew up with parents who were great cooks. My fiancee lost her mom to cancer almost 10 years ago. I always say that she is here with us in spirit. I'm a big believer that the electricity, the energy in our bodies never truly leaves the universe. The energy remains ever present, surrounding each of us and loved ones always remembered. It is up to each of us to never forget. We all return to star dust eventually and it is comforting to look up at night and know that all our family and friends who have passed are shining down on us.
Our hot sauce dreams started 3 years ago in 2014. We rented a small condo and had an very small porch with a great south facing exposure, perfect for growing. My friend Chuck had helped me build some planter boxes, as I love to make it myself rather than pay the corporations for a lesser quality product.
I was excited, the journey was beginning, I got home placed the planters on the deck and planning commenced.
With limited space I filled up our planters, bought some smart pots and started our urban garden.
We both are ambitious trying new healthy foods and juicing for maximum nutrients, I grew my first kale plant and was surprised on how good the smoothies tasted.
Within a few months we started to see our first peppers becoming ripe enough to harvest. My small porch looked like a jungle of pepper greatness!
We then started to get ripe peppers by the plate full!
We started experimenting with our very first batches of Chili Sauces and seasoning mixes.
Before we knew it the first growing season had passed and we were approaching Halloween.
We had finished our final harvests dehydrating as many peppers as we could to save for cooking during winter months.
We cooked many batches trying to achieve the perfect flavor profile.
Winter had passed and Spring was on the rise. 2016 was a time for expansion, I cleared space on the side of my families home in the suburbs and doubled our garden size.
Our peppers where growing well, that said we did have some challenges with a few. We were dealing with a clay rich soil and some nutrient lock up.
I kept two plants going at home on my porch in remembrance of where it all started the previous year.
Within no time we began to see fantastic harvests!
We would easily fill up two to three grocery bags of peppers each week.
We began dehydrating the peppers as fast as we could. The Fall Season was very favorable and we harvested through October.
Winter again approaching and our 2016 grow season came to a close. We had been experimenting with new hot sauce recipes fine tuning our flavors.
This past winter I purchased a Blackdog Led Phyto-Max 2 200 and started my seedling for the 2017 Grow. I really enjoyed working with Blackdog led, they were great.
We are currently growing over 37 varieties of hot chili peppers. With 90 plants overall, next year I plant to grow over 150 chili plants. I will post a follow up to this as soon as I load the pictures up.
We are renting a space in a local FDA approved commissary, producing Seven varieties of hot sauce. We are just completing our Logo and will be selling online and locally in the Northwest Suburbs of Chicagoland next month, August. This has been a great journey and I give much credit to my fiancee for keeping our business and dreams moving forward. I look forward to sharing more of our story and pictures soon.
Thank you for reading this post, I hope you enjoyed as much as I writing this up. I really love life, those who surround me and the new people I get to share our story and hot sauce with.
Best,
Sean
Heat Street Foods LLC