My cousin and I were working together in the original Danny Cash Hot Sauce facility, as seen on the video shot for Food Network. I received a cold email from a "Pepper Pete" in the UK talking about the Naga Jokokia chile pepper. Later, accepted as the "Ghost Chile" because even seasoned chileheads would turn as white as a ghost when they popped one of these into their mouths.

We thought it was a cool idea to get some powder shipped in from India, via the UK, so I gambled on a very expensive little package. We wanted to make something special, so when the powder came in, we tried a little scrape and the I saw colors I never knew existed. I couldn't talk...not because my tongue was numb or because I was in pain, but because it released so many endorphins, that I just kept repeating myself. "We only need 100 bottles." We put a kilogram of the Naga Jolokia powder into a scratch-made sauce consisting of Thai chiles, Peruvian Red Habaneros, apple cider vinegar, and wasabi.

It was smooth, with quick heat, a flare of the nostrils from the wasabi, and then the back burn of the Habanero. Even deeper though, was the long lasting throat and chest burn from the Ghost. It's natural smokiness was new as well. It's one of my all time favorite sauces, even though we don't make large batches of it anymore. It was mind-blowing, and it was America's First Ghost Chile Hot Sauce. We only made 60 bottles for the first batch, but we made many more soon after.