If you're any kind of IdleGuy, you have a garden. And, if you live anywhere south of Canada, you're probably seeing a harvest of abundance. The weather in the U.S. has been very hot, which the peppers love. If you've been diligent about watering, you tomato plants are probably thriving as well.
The three sauces:
Traditional spaghetti sauce
Roasted Bell Pepper Sauce
15-Minute Homemade Hot Sauce
First rule when it comes to spaghetti sauce: Nobody ever died from too much basil, oregano, garlic, pepper, or parsley.
Pasta Sauce Tips
Rather than provide a recipe for making pasta (spaghetti) sauce, here are some tips on the process and ingredients. Most of the best pasta sauce is made in homes in Italy and Sicily by old ladies who’ve been doing it for years, so no two recipes are alike.
Your main ingredients are
Here are some tips about the process:
Before diving in, chop up all your vegetables and brown your meats. Browning, in a little bit of olive oil, gives the meats a bit of texture before they go into the sauce. It also reduces the amount of grease or oil that will go into the sauce (a little oil is OK, a lot is not).
Once you’ve got all your vegetables chopped up, you start making your roux. Start with just enough olive oil to cover the bottom of your pot and bring the heat up to medium-low. start with minced garlic, and add in your other spices, then chopped onions and peppers until you have a rich mixture. Begin adding in tomatoes so that there’s some fluidity. Add your meats and then begin chopping tomatoes into small chunks and adding them until everything begins to steam.
Add water, bring to a boil, reduce to simmer, cover, go have a few beers, stir occasionally. You want the water to be high enough to cover everything. After about an hour, take off the cover so the water will begin to evaporate as the tomatoes break down.
After about two hours, turn the heat off, cover and let it sit. Repeat this process until the mixture is thick and rich. Most people use tomato paste to thicken the sauce. It’s not necessary if you’ve added a good number of roma or other paste-type tomatoes. If it’s not thick enough, adding some store-bought pasta sauce is not a sin.
Make enough sauce so you can enjoy it fresh and maybe for a few days afterward and have some to freeze. Pasta sauce will last years in the freezer, so you’ll have some whenever you need it.
15 Minute Homemade Hot Sauce
I n g r e d i e n t s
The hot sauce turned out fantastic. It is strongly advised to read the original recipe, specially the precautions about handling peppers. Gloves are an absolute essential. Goggles may or may not be necessary. Do not lean over the vinegar-peppers-garlic mix while it is boiling. If you have a range fan, use it. The peppers and vinegar exude strong odors.
Also, this may take a bit longer than 15 minutes. Between chopping up the peppers, boiling and cooling time and blending, a half hour is probably closer to how long it will take.
We used about 12 Tobasco peppers, four good-sized cowherd peppers, half of a small bell pepper, more sea salt than the recipe called for (1/2 teaspoon, we used 1 1/2) but it didn’t have any ill effect. White vinegar was the choice, but apple cider vinegar will be tried next time (we still have lots of peppers growing).
Overall, the hot sauce is very tangy, not too spicy, but very flavorful.
Since hot sauce isn’t very expensive, this isn’t a budget-saving recipe, but more for people with gardens. Peppers generally grow easily, especially in high heat environments, so people with gardens usually have more then they need (same goes for zuccini).
After making the hot sauce, we realized we didn’t really have enough bell peppers to make the bell pepper sauce, but we did have a couple of nice, ripe, red tomatoes and more grape tomatoes and a red onion, so we made salsa, which is always easy. Chopped up peppers, tomatoes, onions, some minced garlic and a little apple cider vinegar, and you’re all set and home made salsa is more nutritious and delicious than most store-bought brands.
Original Recipe
Idleguy.com August 2025 Food & Drink looks into what to do with an abundance of peppers from the garden, and how to make sauces with bell peppers, cowhorn peppers, tobasco peppers, and tomatoes.
Here's the lowdown on the hot sauce.
I n s t r u c t i o n s
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Shown below is a thumbnail of a very cool graphic that shows the Scoville units (heat) of different peppers. Clicking on the pic will open the full-sized graphic in a new window.
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