(Originally written 2/17/2021)
Meet Brimstone Rimjob! A hot sauce with a tale to tell. First the taste, Brimstone is a deeply flavored sauce with a slow burn that sticks around. It has fire roasted tomatoes, roasted red peppers, charred hot peppers, tahini, and Mediterranean & Middle Eastern spices for an earthy flavor and unique texture. Try it on pizza, on a fried egg, a perfect wing sauce as is, and is absolutely incredible in marinades!
As for how this sauce came to be, it’s all thanks to the generosity of Calfkiller Brewing Company’s Don Sergio. One fine summer day in 2018 when visiting with friends, a patron of the brewery stopped in with a tote just filled to the brim with a variety of hot peppers he grew to gift to the Sergio brothers. I made a passing comment as to him really enjoying spicy foods, and he asked if I happened to as well. “Oh yeah, I love me a little heat!” I told him. “Wait right there.”, he instructed. A couple minutes later, Don returned with a gallon bag stuffed with a selection of peppers from the tote. “Have fun, man!”, he said with a smile as I gazed into a bag with habaneros, Thai chilis, Peter peppers, cayenne, and others! Absolutely thrilled to have these peppers drop on my lap, my friends and I began discussing what to do with this spicy bounty, and naturally decided a hot sauce would be the best use. The name came about on the car ride home, where considering the contents of the bag, I knew fire and brimstone was to come. We tossed around a few ideas to tag along with Brimstone until someone in the back shouted “RIMJOB!”. The car erupted in laughter and the name was settled. This is all before even attempting to come up with a recipe!
When I returned home, I got out some hot sauce base staples (garlic, onion, apple cider vinegar) and cut the peppers in half to broil for a nice charred flavor. With only these ingredients in the pot and simmered for a bit I gave it a taste. Friends, I flew a little too close to the sun that day. Pain ensued. My ears were ringing to the point of near-deafness. My eyes teared up until I could barely see. What exactly happened next is locked behind spicy memory, though I can say that my only goal was to make my sauce actually edible at least, so I could return some to Don as a thank you. I rummaged through my pantry looking for ingredients to tame the beast I’d created. Fire roasted tomatoes went in, a jar of roasted red peppers I found, in. Still too spicy! I tried to cool it with some plum jam, some more vinegar, ANYTHING. And then I found the magic ingredient. Tahini. The fat content would bind to the capsaicin and deliver the heat over a longer period of time, and its unique flavor and texture give Brimstone Rimjob its signature look and feel. At last the sauce was not only complete, but *delicious*. A few tweaks to salt and it was ready. The issue I would not realize for a couple weeks, is that in my hot sauce haze, I had neglected to write anything that I did down. Tragically, the jar containing the original recipe fell from the fridge and shattered. I immediately wrote down everything I could remember about what I did and have been working to recreate the original ever since. Each day I fight to honor the legacy of the fallen sauce! It’s as close as its ever been to the original, and simply delicious on just about everything. Pick up a jar (or a few!) for yourself, and taste the history, the struggle, and the glorious burn of Brimstone Rimjob!
