I made a really simple chile sauce last summer that now is my favorite seasoning for eggs, vegetables and main dishes. I make it a little thicker than you want (on the order of Pickapeppa or A1) but you could easily add more vinegar and water to resemble Tabasco.

What I did was take about 2 pounds of ripened Chile de Arbol peppers and wash and chop off the stems. Then chop them up coarsely and put in a stainless steel saucepan. Cover with a 50-50 mixture of vinegar and water and boil for 3-4 hours, adding more liquid as necessary. Make sure you have adequate ventilation: this combination will absolutely *stop* your respiration if you get more than a few minutes of it.

After you've boiled it, pour the whole mixture into a food processor or blender and puree. Cook it down to the thickness you want and put it in a bottle. Refrigerate.

The de Arbols give it a nice, small (but pungent) amount of heat and I think it tastes better than Tabasco sauce, especially on eggs. It's kept beautifully in my refrigerator. I imagine several other types of peppers would produce a nice sauce like this as well.

From the Chile-Heads recipe list. Downloaded from Glen's Mm Recipe Archive, http://www. Erols. Com/hosey.