Trail Buffalo Sauce
Hot sauce and fat, mixed in the pot. Two ingredients, no cooler.
- calories
- 110
- weight
- 0.9 oz
- cal / oz
- 122
- protein
- 0 g
- serves
- 2, scales
- prep
- 2 min
- cook
- 2 min
- total time
- 4 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Snack
- Canister stove
- Alcohol / Esbit
- Campfire coals
- Backpacking
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Bikepacking
- Vegetarian
- Gluten free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Grab and go
- Shelf stable
- Basic
Ingredients
| Cayenne pepper hot sauce | 1/4 cup | Frank's RedHot or any thin vinegar-cayenne sauce |
|---|---|---|
| Ghee | 2 tbsp | shelf-stable in a small screw-top jar; butter powder works too |
| Butter powder | 2 tbsp | only if you skip the ghee |
| Garlic powder | 1/4 tsp | optional |
Method
- Warm the pot over a low flame. Add the ghee and let it turn liquid, ten seconds is enough.
- Pull the pot off the heat before adding the hot sauce, or the vinegar will steam in your face.
- Stir hard until the sauce goes from streaked to one uniform orange. Add the garlic powder if you brought it.
- Pour it over whatever you are eating while it is still warm. It separates as it cools, so stir again if it sits.
Buffalo sauce is just hot sauce cut with fat. The fat does two things: it takes the vinegar edge off so you can eat more of it, and it makes the sauce cling instead of running off. That is the whole mechanism.
The home version uses melted butter, which does not travel. Ghee is butter with the water and milk solids cooked out, so it sits in a pack for weeks without turning. Butter powder is the lighter option and rehydrates straight into the hot sauce, no melting step. Either way, mix off the heat. Boiling this just drives off the vinegar and leaves you with hot grease.
Packing
Decant hot sauce into a small dropper or squeeze bottle at home. Ghee goes in a separate leakproof jar. If you are using butter powder instead, it can ride in a snack bag with the garlic powder already stirred in.
Variations
- No stove: shake butter powder, hot sauce, and a splash of cold water in a bottle. It emulsifies well enough.
- A spoonful of powdered milk thickens it if your hot sauce runs thin.
- Swap ghee for olive oil to make it vegan and dairy-free. The flavor goes closer to a chili oil.
https://domesticsuperhero.com/buffalo-sauce-homemade-recipe