Burt Hamilton originally wanted to concoct a West Indian hot sauce, but found when he added turmeric and other spices his sauces leaned more toward East Indian flavor. Friends loved it.
Burt and his partner, Carly James, decided to bottle Mundi Sauce, and before you can say, “Yowza!” they were stirring 60 gallons of sauce at a time at the University of Arkansas Food Innovation Program plant.
What could be better? Entering their Butternut Bomb sauce (with ingenious ingredients like butternut squash) in the Louisiana Hot Sauce Expo in Lafayette, of course.
More than 62 vendors competed in the Indian Hot Sauce competition, with cooks from Hungary, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and Great Britain vying to be top dog. And who won?
Eureka Springs’ trendsetters Burt and Carly! First Place World’s Hot Sauce Award! True story!
You can buy Mundi Sauce at Hart’s, Bunch’s, Tad’s and Alpine Liquor in town, or stick around for the Cinco de Mayo celebration and competition at Chelsea’s, slightly off Center, at 5 p.m., Thursday, May 5.
BTW, Mundi Sauce is the only FDA sanctioned hot sauce made from scratch in Arkansas. Burt, who does the cooking, said he has a covey of organic gardeners growing a variety of exotically hot peppers this season so they’ll be ready for the Dallas Zest Fest in January.