Author: Scott Roberts

I’m back home trying to readjust to the rigamarole of normal life since returning from the Fiery Foods Show. Here’s a short update to say what’s going on:

I’m in the beginning stages of penning a full account of this past weekend’s events. Expect something in the next few days.

I’ve got a couple of additional photos to upload from the weekend and a lot of photo captions to write. Nothing terribly exciting, mind you, but still noteworthy in my opinion.

I’ll have a drawing for the giveaway contest this Wednesday.

I’m also going to spend a lot of time doing a great deal of website and graphic design, some for clients many of you know very well.

I was mostly tasty and meeting exhibitors today on Friday of the Fiery Foods Show, but I did manage to snap a few photos as well:

2010 Fiery Foods Show Day One Photos Part One | 2010 Fiery Foods Show Day One Photos Part Two

Time to hitch up the horses and hit the trail – I’m almost ready to go westward towards Albuquerque, New Mexico, home of the National Fiery Foods and Barbecue Show. The event, which is in its 22nd year, is touted to be the largest trade show and convention of its kind in the world.

Myself and other chilehead bloggers – including Joe Levinson of The Hot Zone Online and Al “Buddah” Goldenberg of I Love It Spicy – will be there in full force, speaking with the exhibitors, sampling the latest spicy products, snapping photos and getting video for the benefit of all of you who unfortunately cannot attend.

If you yourself are planning to the Fiery Foods Show on Friday, Saturday or Sunday and happen to spot us in the ginormous masses of Fiery Foods Show attendees, please say “hi”! We promise we won’t bite…hard!

This will be my last regular blog post before traveling to the Land of Enchantment (New Mexico’s state nickname). Keep ScottRobertsWeb.com bookmarked (along with the other fine sites I mentioned earlier), for this weekend I’ll be posting reports and uploading oodles of pictures from the show.

Follow my up-to-the-minute exploits in New Mexico on my Twitter account. I plan to post several updates a day before, during and after the show with plenty of photos. (By the way, if you want to follow ALL Fiery Food Show Twitter updates, search for the #NFFS hashtag.)

Don’t forget that some time on Saturday I’ll be posting a video for the hot sauce giveaway contest that any of you at home can enter to win! Sometime this coming Friday or early Saturday morning I’ll be announcing the time that the video will be posted; copy the phrase that’s in the video and send it to me in an e-mail and I’ll put you in a drawing to win the prize pack.

Last but not least, the Fiery Foods and BBQ SuperSite promises to have streaming video this weekend of the show, right on their web page. Don’t forget to hit their site several times to tune into both live and pre-recorded segments.

In my humble li’l opinion, Race City Sauce Works is one of the brightest new stars in the hot sauce world as of late. Owner Chad Lowcock and company boast a small but growing collection of fine sauces; among them is the delicious Lucky Dog Smokey Habanero Honey Mustard, and I’m still figuratively kicking myself for not picking up more at last year’s Weekend of Fire show. I’m pledging to remedying that situation soon! But until then, Chad has generously provided a couple of newer condiments for me to try. The first is the scorching, bhut jolokia-infused 98 Octane Ghost Pepper Reserve and the second is a brand spankin’ and mysterious new sauce called The Green Fairy Absinthe Inferno.

I must note that both bottles have had their tops dipped and coated in a wax resin. Collectors love these things and I think they’re cool looking, but I always feel a tiny bit guilty for having to remove the wax in order to open the bottles, because they’re “meant” to double as collector’s items. But I am NOT a collector; I have only about 10 bottles of hot sauce that I’m intent on never opening. So off goes the wax because I wanna taste these sauces!

Here’s a little number that’s produced by SouthAfricans.com out of Atlanta, GA. It’s called Zulu Zulu Peri Peri Garlic Chile Pepper Sauce. It uses, yep, you guessed it, the ever increasingly-used African Bird’s Eye peppers and states on the bottle that the “original recipe [was] from South African”. I’m always up for trying how others outside of the Western Hemisphere incorporate chile peppers in foods, so let’s see what this sauce has under the hood…

Chile Pepper App Links:
ChilliFarm – http://www.chillifarm.info
Scoville – http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scoville-iPhone-App/302786845717

After much recent teasing and stringing along I’ve done as of late, a
pair of chile-related websites have made their debut – ILoveItSpicy.com
and SpicyRV.com.

I Love It Spicy

Al “Buddah” Goldenberg, myself and other chileheads have debuted a new
blog called I
Love It Spicy that’s geared toward covering everything from
reviews to product recommendations to industry shows & festivals and
more, all on video.

Buddah is currently chronicling activities from this past weekend’s
North Market Fiery Foods Festival in Columbus, Ohio that he captured
on video – a jalapeno eating contest, a wing contest, and lots more
excitement from the show that you don’t want to miss.

There are big plans in the works for I Love It Spicy team getting
clips of next week’s National Fiery Foods & BBQ Show in Albuquerque,
New Mexico on video. There has also been talk about me getting
hypnotized on camera during the show, but I can neither confirm nor
deny those claims…

Catch the fun at ILoveItSpicy.com or follow us on Twitter at @ILoveItSpicy.

Spicy RV

Spicy RV is a
group of wild, ragtag chileheads (headed up by the possibly sane,
probably insane James Beck of EatMoreHeat.com) who will be commandeering a tour
bus and attempt to make a fiery pilgrimage from Houston, Texas to the
National Fiery Foods & BBQ Show (abbreviated NFFS below). The road
trip will be documented on their blog both in written and video formats, so
be sure to track their progress closely as they eat some of the
spiciest food on earth, drink enough margaritas to make even Nick
Nolte’s and Gary Busey’s livers scream for mercy, and hopefully keep
the Highway Patrol at bay before making its grand arrival at the NFFS
next week.

Follow Spicy RV’s psycho circus on wheels on Twitter at @SpicyRV and
through their RSS
Feed.

Follow the Spicy RV crew individually on Twitter: @EatMoreHeat, @TexasFood, @GunsandTacos, @psedillo and @PedroThePepper

What’s More…

Before I close this post out, I shouldn’t neglect to mention that the
NFFS event that both of these websites will be visiting will be joined
by the Fiery Foods and BBQ SuperSite itself in providing online video.
From March 5th through 7th, you can watch both pre-recorded and live
streaming segments from the NFFS at Fiery-Foods.com.

A bit late with news this month from the UK, we had a quick family holiday, but we did use the evening to taste some sauces, the results coming up next month.

So what has been happening at the ChileFoundry since my last report,
well we reported on a number of local UK suppliers
including the Dartmoor Chilli Farm who are taking an Organic and
Holistic view on growing Chillies and the Cambridge Chilli Farm whose
Raspberry and Chilli Jam had a rave review for us by ChilliPepperPete

We also reviewed The Chilli Jam Man’s Oak Smoked Garlic
& Chipotle Jam, The Chilli Pepper Company’s Dragon’s
Breath which was a Caribbean Style Hot Sauce that has been made with fresh Bhut Jolokia chillies. The Marie Sharps Grapefruit Pulp Habanero Pepper Sauce was reviewed by Darth Naga and he was very impressed of the combination…

Heartbreaking Dawns is an up-and-coming sauce maker hailing from upstate New York. They’re steadily making themselves known to the fiery foods world with an intriguing assortment of hot sauces: Classic Gold, Mango Habanero and Jalapeno Pineapple. They and I made out initial communication via Twitter (hey, who says that the social networking giant has no merit?) and before you know it, I had a package of their hot sauces in my hands. Here is my take on each one individually…