Sioux Falls Couple Bottles Homemade Hot Sauce From Garden Peppers
Rodger and Cherie Lacy moved from Houston, Texas, to Sioux Falls in 2017 and began bottling their homemade hot sauce in 2021, turning a backyard gardening hobby into a small-batch operation producing close to 500 bottles this year, KELO reported.
The couple tends to raised garden beds filled with specialty heirloom peppers. Rodger Lacy described the varieties grown in their Sioux Falls yard in an interview reported by KELO.
“She got a pretty good crop of peppers this year. Some real specialty heirloom peppers. The Pink Tiger, Chocolate Ghost Pepper, a Trinidad Scorpion,” Rodger Lacy said, according to Yahoo.
Rodger Lacy tastes every pepper to gauge flavor and heat levels. He noted that the Trinidad Scorpion matches the intense heat of a Carolina Reaper.
“Just brutally hot. I taste everything, so I know what kind of taste, what kind of heat level it’s got. And there’s been some painful tastes,” Rodger Lacy said, Yahoo reported.
Rodger & Cherie’s Fermented Hot Sauce relies on a weeks-long fermentation process that breaks down natural pepper sugars. Unfermented hot sauces gain acidity immediately through added vinegar or citrus.
“I really like the way that it works. And once you pasteurize it and bottle it, it’ll last for years. You can leave it out on the table if you want,” Rodger Lacy said.
Production remains strictly small scale. Rodger Lacy told Yahoo that he produces his fermented sauce one gallon at a time, yielding about twenty 5-ounce bottles per batch.
The recipe incorporates ingredients beyond just chili peppers. Carrots, onions, garlic, and aromatics provide balance and natural sweetness.
After placing in the top three in salsa competitions at Cherry Rock, Rodger Lacy connected with the market’s owner, Marco Patzer.
“He knows his produce. And, I think he does a really nice job,” Marco Patzer said.
Patzer noted that the partnership benefits both the local market and the makers. The product lineup has expanded to include higher-heat variations such as Blue Smoke, alongside fruit-infused options featuring pineapple and watermelon.
At 75 years old, following a career in the oil industry, Rodger Lacy told KELO he does not want to take the operation full time.
“For small batch. I’m about as big as I can get without going full time, and I don’t want to do full time. I mean, I’m 75. I spent a whole life working and now, this is still fun,” Rodger Lacy said, according to Yahoo.