"La Bomba" Antipasto Hot Sauce

It's St. Patrick's Day... I can hear the pub downstairs getting lively. They've set up tents and outdoor porto-potties on the patio too. It's quite the set up. Pretty soon it will be filled with drunken party-goers. I can't drink since I'm all knocked up, the husband is out drinking green beer somewhere, so to celebrate I'm staying in and cooking up a storm. More importantly, I'm raising a glass (of chocolate milk) to my BESTIE and flog partner-in-crime, Amanda because it's her birthday today!
Happy Birthday, special!!

Well the first thing I made today was an antipasto hot sauce. I got the idea from the MOST delicious hot sauce I've ever tried, called La Bomba. I was introduced to it when I asked for hot sauce at Cafe Cinquecento. Since then, I found it at Metro in Liberty village. I'm almost out of it so I thought I'd try to make some at home. I basically just looked at the ingredients listed on the jar and threw in what I had on hand and thought would taste good.

Here's what I came up with:



Ingredients
1 cup eggplant diced very small
8 mushrooms diced very small
1 red pepper diced very small
1 banana pepper diced very small
5 cloves garlic minced
1/4 cup of the best olives you can find, pitted and minced
4 tbsp olive oil
6-7 basil leaves torn
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
7 HOT dried chilies crushed

Directions
Saute garlic and dried chilies on med-low heat in 1 tbsp olive oil until fragrant. Add the mushrooms, red peppers, banana peppers, olives, basil leaves and fennel seeds. Saute until all the veggies are soft. Season with salt and pepper. Allow to cool for a bit and transfer to a jar. Pour 3 tbsp olive oil over the top and store in the fridge. This should last in the fridge for about a month.

La Bomba sauce tastes DELICIOUS on pizza, pasta sauces, crunchy bread or even just tossed with fresh hot pasta.