My info will be a bit sketchy, being based on only one experience making chipotles. But here goes.

Smoke the pods at low temperature for maybe 3 or 4 hours to give them a good smokey flavor. They will not be completely dried at this point. Maybe cutting them in half would help them dry. I smoked them whole, which is the usual way I think.

Then, use a dehydrator to finish drying the chipoltles or put them in an oven at lowest possible setting and the oven door ajar. I did it the second way because, at that time, I did not have a dehydrator.

I hope this helps.

Jim

Here is some info

Here is a link that might be useful: Chipotle

billinpa,

A to B of making Tabasco Chipotle sauce or just producing Chipotle peppers?

I can help with the smoking / drying part but I canÂt help with the sauce solution. I know experienced others will chime in.

Last year I posted a tongue in cheek entry about hating Jalapenos. In the resulting thread I described how I smoke, dry and grind them: http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/pepper/msg102258137156.html

If you use "Chipotle" in the search box at the top of the page you will find a number of other entries on Chipotle or cut and paste this link in your browser: http://search.gardenweb.com/search/?term=chipotle

Also for your reading pleasure, here is a link to a site I found useful when I first became interested in making my own chipotle: http://www.randyq.addr.com/chiles/chipotles.html

If a sauce is what you are really looking for then I suggest you also Google "chipotle in adobo recipe"Â
http://www.google.ca/search?hl=en&q=chipotle+in+adobo+recipe&meta=

One last note as for waiting for fully ripe Jalapenos, I also smoke them green with great results.

Best of luck

Bill

Here is a link that might be useful: I hate Jalapenos

I guess I was a little unclear. Yes I know they are smoked but I am looking to make a Tabasco type sauce from them.

The ingredents on the bottle leave a bit to be desired. Obviously.... LOL

I assume the flavor would change drying them green instead of red.

I have pickled them in the past but looking to try something different this time around. I love the tabasco chipotle sauce. I eat it on just about anything. Lima beans with a chipotle sauce rocks. Good way to get your veg. just with kick.

Thansk for all the links Im a ready through them now.

billinpa,

LOL, now that you know more about what you didnÂt want to know I did a quick search for homemade Tabasco Chipotle sauce. As you probably know there are no direct answers.

I did find the following links that reference recipes for homemade Chipotle and Tabasco type sauces. I have never tried their Chipotle sauce but imagine you could try a few variations of these recipes substituting all Chipotle peppers or a combination of Chipotle and Tabasco peppers.

Let us know if you manage to develop a good match to the original.

Bill

Here are a few links:

http://www.fiery-foods.com/Dave/hotsauce.html

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071216170241AAOINBi

http://www.myrecipefriends.com/recipe/74352.html?PHPSESSID=dfe08815d77b81fae2d61768dc3c6b0d

http://www.myrecipefriends.com/recipe/74352.html?PHPSESSID=dfe08815d77b81fae2d61768dc3c6b0d

http://www.pepperfool.com/recipes/hotsauce_idx.html

Im going to give them a shot. Ill follow up if I nail it down.

Im pretty good a picking up on ingredents in a recipe, but all the vinegar and heat blocks my taste buds.

My guess is that the ingredients are fairly simple. It's the process which will require some investigation and experimentation.

Jim

I think you'll definitely need to go through the process of drying, smoking, then rehydrating them to get the right flavor. Here's another website you might enjoy. It has tons of links, collections of recipes are at the bottom. They might give you a direction. It's a fun site just to read through, anyway.

Here is a link that might be useful: Chile sites

Tabasco takes over 3 years to make. They make a mash of the peppers and salt, then put it in a wooden keg like wine filled with vinegar. The keg has a few holes in the top and they cover the whole thing with several inches of salt, it lets the fermenting gases bubble through, but doesn't let air back in. They do this for 3 years. Then they somehow strain the pulp out and mix it in huge mixers for days with more vinegar. I've toured the plant twice, it's well worth it. I would like to see their storage when you consider every restaurant in North America has their product, they have to have to have just lots sitting around fermenting.

My personal opinion is that the commercial process is not the proper process. It was a necessary process back in 1850 but no longer the correct process. Today we have all kinds of machines to do the job so much better. The simple blender and food processor stainless steel pots and the easy availablity of glass bottles and vinegar all help in the process.

Hot sauce is simple. It is the simple combination of peppers and vinegar with ageing to allow flavors to blend together. Do not make it complex and you will have much more success. Everything else is Sales Hype.

You can make a simple hot sauce that is much better than the commercial product by simply adding chipotle powder to vinegar and maybe some water to replace the dehydration. As you add more powder and less water or vinegar you will see that the quality of the sauce will become much better. It simply cost more and that cuts into the commercial profits. But we are not constrained by greedy profits.

Bye the way if you want a good hot sauce you must get some Cholula sauce. 100 times better than the McIllihenny watered down, no taste left, salty junk. Cholula will sell you 4 half gallon bottles at a low price shipped in a case. Super deal.

Every batch of hot sauce I ever make is always better then the commercial junk because I do not water it down and I get full flavor. I have not made chipotle sauce because I tasted the mcillihenny chipotle and thought it tasted like salty water. what a waste of good hot peppers.

If you have any questions simply ask.

The one question I am most interested in is how much dehydration takes place. for example 100 pounds of fresh peppers become how many pounds of dry peppers or another way is to say it takes how many pounds of fresh to make one pound of dry peppers. This would tell me how much water I might add to make the hot sauce. Also how much chipotle powder to make a gallon of hot sauce. etc.

without that info I would buy a pound or more of chipotle powder and look to make a batch of say a gallon of sauce. and let it age. I suspect a pound of powder will be good for a gallon of hot sauce. I would dump the powder into the gallon glass bottle and fill with vinegar cap the bottle and let it age. Actually half vinegar and half water should work. Remember to age in the dark. and cool if possible. Now what could be easier then this. I would buy the chipotle powder. it is low cost. search the web for best price. If you have an extra pound of powder put it into a glass jar in the freezer.

Here is a link that might be useful: cholula

Ebay has chipotle powder in one pound bags for about $20 a pound. I do not know if that is a good price or not. You will have to add shipping.

Here is a link that might be useful: ebay

The best I found is at Amazon.com

it looks like about $5 a pound in bulk. 10 pounds for about $45 is real good. it looks like $10 for a pound amd quarter. or 6 of them in a case. etc. they even have a 50 pound bag for real chile heads. haha.

I did not look that hard. Maybe someone will post a better place.

If you figure this at about a pound per gallon that would be about 20 cents a 5 ounce woozie for a high quality sauce.

Ebay wants about $27 a pound with delivery charge. So here you get it at $5 or $6 per pound delivered. I did not work out delivery on this. It really is a super price compared to the other prices.

Here is a link that might be useful: Chipotle powder

I'd add here that there are powdered chipotle, and then there are other powdered chipotle - the difference between a good one and one that isn't is pretty staggering. I get mine now through Penzy's, which is the best quality I've found, by far. Not to say that others might be as good, or better, but sometimes, ya get what ya pay for. It might be worth sampling some first to see if it's good enough for what you want to do.

And I'll second the suggestion of making the sauce from the powder, vinegar, and letting it age a while. I'd also suggest thinking hard about the vinegar you use, that can really influence the result - cider, white wine, red wine, and so on, and throwing in some other spices as well, thinking here of a bit of tarragon, black pepper corns, maybe cumin. A bit for background flavor.

Sounds like fun.

RICE WINE vinegar is suppose to be smooth. I believe some people add some garlic for punch. I never tried it but I am tempted to try some with chimayo powder. for a touch of sweetener you might try some concentrated grape juice or other juice concentrate. just a touch to take the edge off the vinegar. the grape juice is to see if you can add a little side flavor.

I did a batch last year which came out pretty good:....

smoked jalapenos, then de-seeded

Tomato paste

smoked garlic cloves & onion chunks

salt

white vinegar

I thought I'd update my experiment with this - in Sept, I took 4 oz of chipotle poweder, mixed it with 3 cups organic red wine vinegar, 4 x 6 inch sprigs of French tarragon, put the lot in a qt canning jar, and left it in the 50º pantry.

Opened that up yesterday, approx 100 days later, discarded the tarragon, and poured it into a squeeze bottle. Good stuff. It tends to separate, so needs a swirl-ana-shake before each use.

It could use a bit of garlic flavor, and maybe a hint of cumin. Even still, it leaves the Tobassco stuff in the dust.

off to scramble some eggs......

The only Chipotle I know of around here comes packed in adobe sauce. I use it most often for chili and barbeque sauce...great smokey flavor. Found this recipe but can't say whether it's the same ingredients found in the store bought I get.

Vera

Here is a link that might be useful: Adobe Sause

I have done it twice this year since we have such a large hot pepper crop.

The best way is to let them ripen on the vine, but green will also work. I also did some smoking with the hot wax peppers and with some ripe serrano peppers (yum).

The process was just as describe by Jim above (Jimster). We smoked them first in a smoker (using mesquite wood) for a couple of hours. After that, I cut them in chunks and placed them in the dehydrator for half a day or however long it takes to dry them.

I have already used some smoked hot pepper chunks (AKA chipotles) for black bean soup. Also, you can simply grind up a small amount in a spice grinder and you get powdered smoked hot peppers. Just use as is, or add vinegar, tomatoes, spices, anything you want. I like to just grind them up and use as they are. They really are wonderful stuff, I will make them again.

I searched the web to see if I could make a homemade smoker for all my red jalepenos (and I have a lot of those). I found this site, and I love it!! I might even try chicken in it if it works!

Here is a link that might be useful: Homemade Smoker

We have an old dedicated smoker but it is basically the same thing shown on the link, and most gardeners would have clay pots around, very economical and clever!

Chipotle is made in Mexico at very low temperature over a long period (days).

You can hold you hand comfortably in the smoke and it is less than 100F. It is a method of smoke drying, not smoke cooking.

Willard, thanks! I'll be sure to keep the temp low on my hot plate (when I get that smoker assembled) and keep adding soaked wood chips so it can smoke for (days?) I'm looking forward to this adventure!!
Suzi

A word of caution. I tried to smoke my own hot peppers this fall with mesquite wood, and ended up with something that was completely inedible. That stuff is strong.

So try it with a single pepper or two until you get the technique and amounts and temperature down. Don't do it like I did, which was fill the smoker with half a bushel of peppers and torch off a cubic foot of mesquite wood in the fuel box.