Batch No. 001 · Live

Every number,
published.

Most hot sauce asks you to take its word for it. We keep a log because we have to — a scheduled process requires it — so we may as well show you. This page updates as the batch moves.

42Days in brineTarget 42–56
3.42Equilibrium pHCeiling 3.60
2.5%Brine salinityBy total weight
1,000Bottles in batchThen back to the barrels

The log

Where it is
right now.

Twelve weeks from first pepper to the Tennessee Hot Sauce Expo on 24 October. The ferment is the long pole — everything else queues behind it.

  1. Aug 3

    Ferment started

    Peppers stemmed, packed, submerged in 2.5% brine. Two vessels — one for validation, one for production.

  2. Aug 10

    Active fermentation

    Vigorous bubbling days 3–10. Brine gone cloudy, which is lactobacillus and is correct.

  3. Aug 31

    Validation batch pulled

    Ferment reads pH 3.42. One bench batch per sauce, corrected to target, 4 oz of each shipped to UT Food Science.

  4. Sep 28

    Process authority letter

    The formula freezes here. Labels get ordered the same day — not before, because a change to the acid ratio can reorder the ingredient panel.

  5. Oct 4–18

    Production

    Three cook weekends. Hot-filled at 190°F, capped, inverted two minutes, banded, lot-coded.

  6. Oct 24

    Tennessee Hot Sauce Expo

    First bottles in hand. Founding-batch lot numbers on every one.

Why 3.42

The one number
that matters.

4.6 is the safety line. Below it, Clostridium botulinum cannot produce toxin. That is the entire reason shelf-stable hot sauce is safe, and it is not a matter of opinion.

We formulate to 3.42, well under our own 3.60 ceiling and far under 4.6. The margin is deliberate — pH drifts a little as solids exchange acid with the liquid, so the reading that counts is taken 24 hours after bottling, not straight off the stove.

Common myth: that pH under 4.0 exempts you from the acidified-foods rule. It does not. It only changes which measuring method is permitted. We use a calibrated meter either way.

What's on every bottle

  • Lot code Permanently marked, identifying the batch and the day it was packed.
  • Full ingredients No gums, no dyes, no capsaicin extract, no "natural flavors."
  • Two retained bottles Held from every batch for a year, so if anything is ever wrong we know exactly which bottles to call back.

Ask and we'll send it

The full log for your lot — ferment duration, pH at completion, fill temperature, equilibrium pH at 24 hours. Email us the code off the bottle.

Batch 001

One thousand bottles,
then we start again.

Get on the list and you'll have first claim, a founding-batch lot number, and the pH log if you want it. We think that's the interesting part.

Claim a bottle