Easter

A Genius, One-Ingredient Trick to Make All Those Eggs Way More Exciting

March 28, 2018

This spicy little number might look like regular old cayenne. But make no mistake: It's the most powerful new player you can add to your salt-and-pepper rotation—for your eggs or anything else at risk of being humdrum. Humdrum stops here!

Unlike cayenne—a fairly straightforward, wall-of-heat experience—this mysterious red powder is tangy and salty and smoky, too, as well-rounded as singular-seeming spices come.

That’s because it’s distilled straight from Sriracha, the beloved squeezy bottle of hot sauce with the rooster on it (although how good would it be made with the homemade stuff or this fancy Gochujang Sriracha)?

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Spice companies actually bottle and sell sriracha powder, but it’s astonishingly easy to make it yourself—especially because I’m pretty sure you have a bottle of rooster sauce in your fridge door right now.

The trick comes from Top Chef alum Dale Talde and his eponymous Brooklyn restaurant Talde, where, back in 2012, he took to drying out Sriracha in the oven and crumbling it into into a feisty powder. He then folded this into ranch dressing (as he called it, Sri-rancha) for what turned out to be a very exciting wedge salad.

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Top Comment:
“This is a must-try, and looks like a great way to use sriracha up before it starts to turn.”
— M
Comment

Why not just use a squirt from the bottle of Sriracha instead, like you always do? For one thing, in coaxing all the moisture out, the heat and tang and everything else we love about Sriracha concentrates, and the powder left behind is even more intensely Sriracha-y.

It also has an entirely novel texture that you get to control. Crunch it up fine, like you see here, or leave it flakier and you have what Eunice Choi, our Director of Brand Activation, called the fleur de sel of Sriracha. So fancy! Plus the effort-to-reward ratio for this whole endeavor is tipped emphatically in the right direction.

There’s no need for a dehydrator or other special equipment, just that you take advantage of a little down time. Spread sriracha into a thin thin layer, then stick it in the oven at 200° F to dry out. Your kitchen will be filled with a gentle eau de rooster for the next hour or so, and then poof! You have a little jar of firecrackers to dispense in pinches onto anything you want. Starting with eggs. Lots and lots of eggs.

Photos by Luzena Adams

Got a genius recipe to share—from a classic cookbook, an online source, or anywhere, really? Please send it my way (and tell me what's so smart about it) at [email protected]—thank you to Elana Carlson for this one!

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See what other Food52 readers are saying.

  • Wendy Dow
    Wendy Dow
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    Jake Ahz
  • M
    M
  • Kristen Miglore
    Kristen Miglore
  • Sandy Alaniz
    Sandy Alaniz
I'm an ex-economist, lifelong-Californian who moved to New York to work in food media in 2007, before returning to the land of Dutch Crunch bread and tri-tip barbecues in 2020. Dodgy career choices aside, I can't help but apply the rational tendencies of my former life to things like: recipe tweaking, digging up obscure facts about pizza, and deciding how many pastries to put in my purse for "later."

6 Comments

Wendy D. December 26, 2018
Hmmm. How many hours should I expect this to take?
 
Kristen M. January 2, 2019
Hi Wendy, it's about 1 hour 20 minutes, depending on how thick you spread it—you can click through on the "View Recipe" button above to get the full recipe instructions (and save and print and all that jazz) but I'll also link it here: https://food52.com/recipes/76459-dale-talde-s-sriracha-powder
 
Jake A. April 2, 2018
I've been spreading this on parchment paper; makes it easier to pour into my spice jar....
 
M March 28, 2018
This is a must-try, and looks like a great way to use sriracha up before it starts to turn.
 
Kristen M. March 30, 2018
I hadn't really thought of Sriracha turning before—eek!
 
Sandy A. December 26, 2018
My sriracha doesn't stick around long enough for it to turn! :)