The 18th Annual Texas Hot Sauce Festival is Coming!

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It’s almost here!

Texas Hot Sauce Festival will be held September 22 & 23, 2018 on Saturday from 11am to 6pm and Sunday from Noon to 5pm at the Bayou City Event Center

What’s Gonna Be There?

Hot sauce, salsa, chips, dips, peppers, spices, marinades, rubs, jams/jelly, pickled products, condiments, soup mixes, chili mixes, wing sauces, … chunky, spicy, smooth, garlicky, sweet, fruity, peppery, smokey…  HOT  and  MILD!   Hundreds of hot and spicy products to try out from around the country.  There is also plenty of food and cold beverages, ongoing stage entertainment, a chile-dren area (including some free and some ‘pay as you go’ activities for the kids), retail vendors, arts & crafts and pepper merchandise.

Entertainment…

High River Sauces Presents the Chi-Town Hot Sauce Expo June 23 and 24, 2018

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Save The Date. June 23 & 24, 2018. Toyota Park in the Chicago, IL area. It’s Going To Be A Party!!

Chicagoland Will Never Be the Same!

Come to Toyota Park in Bridgeview, IL for this two-day Fiery Foods Festival to get the ultimate endorphin rush. The weekend promises to be like no other. The 1st Annual Chi-Town Hot Sauce Expo features FREE Hot Sauce Tastings from the BEST Hot Sauce Companies around the World, The Stage of DOOM, Booze & Infuse Cocktail Competition, Guinness Book of Records Reaper Eating Contest, Chihuahua Beauty Pageant, Craft Beers, Specialty Cocktails & So Much More!!

More details to come soon. Get the latest updates at https://www.facebook.com/chitownhotsauceexpo.

Inferno Fest is Back, Heating Up the Chicago Area!

inferno-fest-2017HIGHWOOD IS HEATING UP: INFERNO FEST IS BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28th FROM 4:30-9:30 PM, EVERTS PARK

Highlights include assorted spicy food creations and Inferno Fest Eating Contest

HIGHWOOD, IL (JUNE 28, 2017) – Celebrate Highwood is fired up to announce the return of Inferno Fest on Wednesday, June 28th, from 4:30-9:30pm in Everts Park (130 Highwood Avenue). Back by popular demand, Inferno Fest will test the taste buds of the most fearless food enthusiasts with the hottest and spiciest foods and beverages. For those worried they may not be able to handle the heat, have no fear, the event will take place in conjunction with all the fabulous vendors at the weekly Highwood Evening Gourmet Market.

Help Support Tasting the Heat!

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Tasting The Heat is currently the best media show ANYWHERE that does hot sauce reviews, interviews and live shows for small batch gourmet hot sauce and spicy food makers. I consider Tasting the Heat host Kendall Stadler to be the man who is most suited for picking up the mantle once held by people like Brian & Marilyn Meagher and also myself with our various fiery foods industry podcasts and YouTube videos.

Kendall is currently raising money to help cover the costs of attending the New York Hot Sauce Expo, April 22 & 23-2017. This is one of THE premier fiery food events on the planet! If your’re a fan of Tasting The Heat, we’re sure you can easily imagine the excitement of being able to deliver live interviews with sauce and fiery food makers, as well as showcasing some of the products…

Houston Comes Alive This Fall with the Texas Hot Sauce Festival!

texas-hot-sauce-festival-september-2017I’m ecstatic to report that a hot sauce festival is once again happening in the Houston, Texas area this coming Fall!

Since show producer Carol Borge lost the rights to the name Houston Hot Sauce Festival last year, both disappointed chileheads and fiery foods vendors have wondered if this beloved annual event would cease to exist or if it would ever return in some shape or form. Carol is indeed roaring back with a show that promises to be bigger and better than ever with the new Texas Hot Sauce Festival!

Borrowing the mantra of its predecessor event of “Always in September,” the Texas Hot Sauce Festival will be held on September 23 and 24, 2017 (with Saturday hours of 11am – 6pm and Sunday hours of noon – 5pm). The locale for this new THSF will be the Bayou City Event Center at 9401 Knight Road, Houston, TX 77045…

National Hot Sauce Day is Coming… January 22, 2017!

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If all of you chileheads didn’t know, this coming Sunday, January 22, 2017 is National Hot Sauce Day!

Not that hot sauce addicts, heat lovers and spice junkies need any excuse to eat any fiery foods; but still, it’s a time to “officially” celebrate, knowing that the capsaicin-infused foods we all love are finally getting some publicity all
over the country.

You are encouraged to post up your hot sauce-laden foods all over Twitter, Instragram or Facebook using the hashtag #nationalhotsauceday.

You can view the “official” NSSD pages here:

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/nationalhotsauceday
Website: http://www.natlhotsauceday.com

Viva la Hot Sauce! Power to the Pepper!

Firetalkers – Interview with Guinness World Record Carolina Reaper Eating Champ Greg Foster

greg-foster-guinness-world-record-holder-carolina-reaper-chile-pepper-eating-contestJust a few weeks ago at the first annual Arizona Hot Sauce Expo, daredevil chile pepper eater Greg Foster of Irvine, CA break the Guinness World Record for consuming the largest amount of Carolina Reaper chile peppers in one minute.
Greg was able to set a new record by munching down a mind-blowing 120 grams of Carolina Reapers (which came out to be 16 pepper pods) within 60 seconds. These Guinness World Record Reaper Challenges are held at all of the hot sauce expos produced by Steve Seabury and High River Sauces, which included the aforementioned Arizona Hot Sauce Expo, plus the NYC, California, and Portland Hot Sauce Expos.

For those of you who don’t know, the Smokin’ Ed’s Carolina Reaper peppers are the Guinness World Record hottest chile, and average at around 1,569,300 units of the Scoville Heat Scale. Carolina Reapers were developed and grown by Ed Currie of the PuckerButt Pepper Company.

So how exactly did Greg did it? I recently chatted with him and asked him how he got into fiery foods, what he did to prepare himself for this challenge, and what it was like to go through the nuclear heat pain after consuming all of those chile peppers…

The NYC Hot Sauce Expo Celebrates Its 5th Anniversary

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
November 27, 2016

The NYC Hot Sauce Expo Celebrates Its 5th Anniversary

New York’s own High River Sauces proudly presents the 5th Annual New York City Hot Sauce Expo on April 22nd & 23rd 2017. The NYC Expo will feature up to 45 artisanal hot sauce makers from all over the United States and as far as Australia, Canada, England, New Zealand and South America. The NYC Hot Sauce Expo has grown into an International Hot Sauce celebration. Witness the action packed event with hot sauce tastings, eating challenges, spicy food vendors, craft beer, spicy cocktails and plenty of odd ball entertainment for the whole family…

Jungle Jim’s Weekend of Fire X – 10 Years of Heating Up the Midwest

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Are you serious? Jungle Jim’s Weekend of Fire fiery foods show is already turning 10 years old? Outrageous!

The venerable Weekend of Fire (or WOF for short) is an expo that will always remain special to me. Why? It was one of the first hot sauce festivals of any kind that I’ve attended. Unlike more “national”, larger-scale events like the Fiery Foods Show in Albuquerque, New Mexico or ZestFest in the Dallas/Ft. Worth, Texas area, the WOF felt a little more like “home” in its more centrally-located digs in Fairfield, Ohio, inside of the Cincinnati metro area. During the first several years of the WOF, the Jungle Jim’s staff graciously let us fiery foods bloggers have our own booth (which we’ve used for various purposes, from being a “hub” to plug in and charge our electronic devices to raising money for charities) at the show. Us bloggers have been able to give massive amounts of input into the show, including the schedule structure and eating contests. We’ve recorded chilehead round table podcast episodes there on the premises. The WOF’s venue is the Oscar Event Center, which is technically a part of Jungle Jim’s International Market, one of the greatest supermarket experiences in the world. Last, but not least, the WOF has often coincided with the unaffiliated CaJohn’s Open Houses 90 minutes northeast in Columbus, Ohio, itself a lighter, fun excursion for hardcore chileheads.

And now…this li’l ol’ show has been going on for ten years? Where in the world has the time gone?

Anyway, this year’s Weekend of Fire marks a return of the Roberts clan to the event. We’ll be hitting most, if not all, of both days it is open – Saturday, October 1st and Sunday, October 2nd. If you happen to see any of us wondering about the show floor, feel free to stop and say “hi!”

If you are looking for any reason to attend, let me give you a few:

There are plenty of fun eating contests to participate in or just watch (merely witnessing eager contestants scarfing down large quantities of scorching hot buffalo wings, hot dogs, pie, pizza, and more while sweating and turning lobster-red is a blast in and of itself). A full schedule of food battles can be found at…

SauceFest LLC Announces Postponement of Festival

saucefest-houston-txGourmet Food and Music Festival Postponed Until 2017

Houston, TX | August 1, 2016:

SauceFest LLC (“SauceFest”) regrets to announce that the gourmet food and music festival’s inaugural run has been postponed until the fall of 2017. The event was originally scheduled to take place October 22-23, 2016 on the streets of East Downtown Houston. The festival is now tentatively scheduled for October 2017.

To ensure that SauceFest 2017 brings the heat, iBurn® is working with Houston’s own Pegstar Concerts to deliver a music lineup that only Pegstar can deliver. The 2-day festival will also feature gourmet food products with heat levels ranging from mild to the world’s hottest, craft beer and liquor brands, local restaurants, cooking demonstrations, and eating…

2016 St. Louis Wing Ding is Coming!

Wing-Ding-Buffalo-Wings(St. Louis, MO) Local restaurants will compete to see who has the “best chicken wings” in St. Louis at the 6th Annual Wing Ding St. Louis. This year’s event will be from 6:00 pm until 9:00 pm, August 11, 2016, at Queeny Park (Greensfelder Arena), (at 550 Weidman Road, Ballwin, MO 63011).  The Wing Ding is sponsored by Schlafly, CARF International, 105.7 The Point, Coca-Cola, Ices Plain and Fancy and Nothing Bundt Cakes.

2016 Oxnard Salsa Festival

oxnard-salsa-festival 20162016 Oxnard Salsa Festival
23rd Annual Festival

Celebrating Salsa – The Food, the Music & the Dance!
July 30-31, 2016
Plaza Park, Downtown Oxnard
11 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Free Admission and Parking

Oxnard, CA – Get ready to spice things up during the 23rd Annual Oxnard Salsa Festival!  One of Oxnard’s signature events, the Oxnard Salsa Festival celebrates salsa food, music and dance on July 30-31, 2016 at Plaza Park, Fifth and “B” Streets, in historic downtown Oxnard.

Presented by the Oxnard Downtowners, the annual event features spicy food and hot entertainment, attracting an estimated 45,000 salsa lovers to the City of Oxnard for the two-day action-packed…

CookOut NYC Little Big BBQ to Feature Ribs King of NYC Ribs Cookoff, Battle of the Sides

Cookout NYC Little Big BBQ 2016Start summer off right with CookOut NYC’s Little Big BBQ, taking place Saturday, June 18th, on the East River waterfront (enter at 23rd Street). Join 10+ meat chefs and pitmasters as they compete in a ribs cookoff (inspired by Brisket King of NYC) with daytime programming to include a “Battle of the Sides” competition ($45 all-inclusive daytime session; evening all-inclusive tickets starting at $55).

The weekend before our Little Big BBQ will be the Big Apple BBQ where chefs from all over the country will compete for best in show meats. We’re taking a page from that book and one from our own with a NYC-only chef competition that will crown (a la Brisket King) a Ribs King of NYC™ (both judges and people’s choice awards will be given out). Plus, we’ll add in plenty of vegetarian options for an all-inclusive BBQ eating and drinking experience during a daytime session that will focus on great sides that go with barbecue and the evening Ribs King of NYC Cookoff. Ticketing options include:

Saturday Evening Session – All-Inclusive Ribs King of NYC Ribs Cookoff Competition (21+)

  • 5-9PM – $100 VIP ticket – includes access to special VIP seated section on the stage plus an extra hour of…

Summer Fest – One Weekend, Three Festivals

sun-prairie-wisconsin-summer-feast-bacon-brew-bbq-festThe ultimate festival for food lovers, families & craft beer enthusiasts in Wisconsin.

The Summer Feast is a 3-day celebration from June 24-26th in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin (near Madison), featuring specialty cuisines, craft beers and music. Each day, Chefs focus on different flavors which makes each day of the festival unique. There are activities for kids and adults, live music, Junior Chef Competitions and much more. The Friday & Sunday events offer free admission, are family-friendly and allow for multiple food choices at affordable prices. Saturday is for adults 21 and up and is an All-You Can Eat & Drink Festival which requires an advance ticket purchase. Enjoy three of the most unique food festivals, all in one location, all in one weekend…

Hot Sauce Festival Season Heats Up in 2016

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Just when you think things couldn’t get any hotter, think again.

More fiery foods events are being set ablaze all of the U.S. this year. And while more events does not necessarily equal satisfaction and success on all levels, there are a handful of events – including a pair of new expos – that have an excellent chance of elevating the chilehead community to another exciting level. Why, you might ask? Because they are produced or co-produced by none other than Steve Seabury himself, the man behind the hugely successful New York City Hot Sauce Expo.

Both returning for a second go-around are the California Hot Sauce Expo and the NJ Taco Festival.

The California Hot Sauce Expo, scheduled for July 16th and 17th, is similar in a lot of ways to the kick-ass NYC event in its formatting, with vendors galore and spicy eating contest, just instead hosted in sunny Long Beach, CA as opposed to the cool, crisp Brooklyn streets.

The NJ Taco Festival, while alike in a…