(2009-05-20) Sriracha

Some American consumers believe Sri Racha (properly pronounced SIR-rotch-ah) to be a Thai sauce. Others think it is Vietnamese. The truth is that sriracha, as manufactured by Huy Fong Foods, may be best understood as an American sauce, a polyglot puree with roots in different places and peoples. It's become a sleeve trick for chefs like Jean-Georges Vongerichten. At the restaurant Perry St., in New York City, Mr. Vongerichten's rice-cracker-crusted tuna with citrus sauce has always relied on the sweet, garlicky heat of sriracha. More recently, he has honed additional uses. "The other night, I used some of the green-cap stuff with asparagus," Mr. Vongerichten said. "It's well balanced, perfect in a hollandaise."... Sriracha is a key ingredient in Street Vendor food: The two Kogi Korean trucks that travel the streets of Los Angeles, vending kimchi-garnished tacos to the young, hip and hungry, provide customers with just one condiment, Huy Fong sriracha. Recently, Huy Fong's sriracha found its place in the Suburb-s. Applebee's has begun serving fried shrimp with a mix of mayonnaise and Huy Fong sriracha. (Eating)

"After I came to America, after I came to Los Angeles, I remember seeing Heinz 57 ketchup and thinking: The 1984 Olympics are coming. How about I come up with a Tran 84, something I can sell to everyone?" What Mr. Tran developed in Los Angeles in the early 1980s was his own take on a traditional Asian chili sauce... Multicultural appeal was engineered into the product: the ingredient list on the back of the bottle is written in Vietnamese, Chinese, English, French and Spanish. And serving suggestions include pizzas, hot dogs, hamburgers and, for French speakers, pates... More than 10 million bottles of sriracha now roll off the Rosemead line each year... "But we still sell 80 percent of our product to Asian companies, for distribution through Asian channels. That's the market we know. That's the market we want to serve."