By Arianne Wing, The Sentinel
I wasn’t among the sriracha lovers who panicked late October when the city of Irwindale filed a law suit claiming that Huy Fong Foods was responsible for a noxious odor originating from its plant, causing runny eyes, throat irritations and headaches. I wasn’t alarmed because a few years ago I began making my own sriracha sauce. I had wondered if I could duplicate Huy Fong Foods’ sriracha sauce (a.k.a. Rooster Sauce) and wanted to create a condiment that was just as addictive in its spicy flavor with garlicky and ever so slightly sweet undertones.
sriracha
It was a bit of a challenge. I can’t think of another condiment sauce that has as big a cult following as Huy Fong Foods’ sriracha sauce. Over 10 million bottles of it are sold each year.
Before I pulled out my pots and pans, I did a little research on sriracha recipes as well as Huy Fong Foods. The company’s owner and creator of its sriracha sauce, David Tran, is Vietnamese of Chinese descent. Tran was making and marketing his hot sauce in Vietnam before he was forced to escape to the United States because of the communist regime. Tran and his family eventually settled in Los Angeles and began to make his hot sauce in a building located in Chinatown. As the saying goes, the rest is history. The bottle with the green top is found in grocery stores everywhere and has become a staple in homes and professional kitchens across the country.
Besides its bright color and heady taste, part of the sauce’s charm is in its packaging. I love the significance and meaning in all of the details. Huy Fong Foods designed its bottles to resemble a chili pepper. The bright green squirt cap suggests the stem of a fresh jalapeno and the clear bottle shows off the bright red of the chili sauce.
Read the full article by Arianne Wing from The Sentinel.
