Sunshine Hot Sauce

I plant one Habanero chile plant each summer. The peppers are so hot that I don't need very many - enough for a batch of hot sauce, a few more to freeze, and then a few to hang in a little ristra to dry, to grind into powder. I've learned that even those I have to harvest green, if full-size, can be left out on the counter in a bowl and will ripen to orange.

This past summer my one plant did really well, for my climate, anyway. My hot sauce recipe makes 1 quart but this year I had enough Habaneros for all my own uses plus a second quart of sauce. I just reuse the same bottles for my own hot sauce, but needed to find some way to package that second quart to give away as Christmas gifts. I found a bottle company on-line here, and ordered a case of 12 5-ounce sauce bottles plus the drip shaker inserts, tax and delivery, for $20.

I sterilized and filled 6 bottles, storing the other half-case for the next time I get a bumper crop. Since the sauce is such a pretty yellow-orange color, I decided to call it Sunshine Hot Sauce (not quite as hot as the sun, but close), and created a label to fit on 2" x 4" shipping labels. The labels were a little taller than the flat side of the bottles, so they're pleated a bit on the curves top and bottom, but I like the way they look. In fact, a couple of the people I've given them to are amazed when they realize that it's something I made myself, instead of a professional company product.