foodsources
Hot right now
Spice seekers have a burning love for this Winnipeg hot sauce with a Sri Lankan twist
By Joelle Kidd
How do you explain a food trend ? What formula of inspiration , marketing , and general zeitgeist combines to determine when an ingredient skyrockets in popularity ? The answer may be that we know it when we see it — and what we ’ re seeing is hot sauce . The segment of the market dedicated to fiery , tongue-tingling condiments is booming , projected to be worth 4.38 billion USD worldwide by
2028 , according to Fortune Business insights . In Canada , the pandemic boosted sales of artisan hot sauce , as more time in the kitchen had home cooks reaching for new products and spicy flavours to beat the lockdown blues . Add this to the steadily simmering hot sauce mania growing online - including viral hot sauce based TikTok challenges and popular You- Tube show Hot Ones , where celebs are interviewed while sampling steadily spicier sauces - and a trend is born .
Enter onto the scene a Winnipeg-based small batch hot sauce brand . Tasty Heat ’ s launched in 2016 , and it turned out to be just the right time and place . With inventive recipes and a passion for flavour , this family run brand is poised to capitalize on the capsaicin craze .
Amila Rajakaruna and Arshala Dona are the power couple behind the brand . After moving to Canada from Sri Lanka , they found they missed the flavours they ’ d left behind .
“ We found that the spices that we so loved in our native Sri Lanka did not taste the same here ,” recalls Arshala . While hot sauce is not a common staple in Sri Lanka , Amila had the inventive idea that a sauce could capture the flavour profile they were missing . The resulting blend of traditional spices , fruits , and Scotch bonnet peppers tasted like home .
The couple originally planned simply to gift the sauce as a Christmas present for friends and relatives , but after hearing rave reviews , a business dream was born .
Tasty Heat ’ s now offers a range of six hot sauces , a chili paste , and an instant curry powder . The brand can be found on retail shelves across the city , in specialty food stores and big grocery chains alike , as well as at stockists in Alberta , Saskatchewan and Ontario . Chefs have taken notice too ; in 2020 , Tasty Heat ’ s collaborated with chef Ryan Glays of Junction 59 Roadhouse to create a signature sauce for the restaurant .
Hot heads , those hot sauce fans always seeking something higher on the scoville scale , have flocked to Tasty Heat ’ s sauces . No matter how spicy their prod-
Photography by Makena Hughes
8 ciao ! / mar / apr / two thousand twenty-two