Shawna's Favorite! Red Fire Devil Ramen Noodles with Pepitas and Shrimp

     I really had to cook this ramen recipe to please myself today!  Sometimes I need my medicine.  My medicine is very hot spicy chile peppers!
     I usually have a steady diet of hot chili peppers or hot sauce in my personal food.  Ever since I started this recipe blog, the chile pepper diet has gone by the wayside.  My skin, sinuses and my health were far better when I was eating a steady diet of hot chile peppers.
     In restaurants that I worked in, nobody willingly wanted to sample food that I prepared for myself!  I had a reputation for cooking light meals for myself in restaurant kitchens that were so spicy hot, that the other chefs were scared to even ask what I was eating.  I could not wait for someone to get interested in what I was eating, so I could coax that person to try a bite of my dinner!  Many cooks that were naive enough to sample my personal spicy meal, simply spit out what I made and they ran for a water cooler in a big hurry!
     Mexican cooks used call me crazy for eating so many hot peppers.  I have never met a Mexican cook that liked hot chile peppers as much as I do!  Mexicans do have a reputation for using hot chile peppers in their cooking, but many Mexicans prefer milder flavors.
     The best reaction that I had to my chile pepper kitchen meal was when a real "tweaky" party animal kind of waiter was watching me eat a few raw green hot chile peppers.  The waiter asked what kind of peppers I was eating.  I saw a chance to set up another victim for a hot chile pepper overdose experience!
    The waiter asked how hot the chiles were.  I responded by telling the waiter that the peppers were Carolina Red Chiles that were still in the green stage of growth.  I told the waiter that these Carolina chiles were very spicy hot and there was no way that he could handle one!
     The waiter said that he would eat one of my home grown chile peppers if the Mexican cooks and myself would all pitch in and wager $10.00!  The Mexican cooks looked at me with straight faces.  They did not even bother to wink!  I told the Mexican cooks to not even bother getting the money out of their pockets to cover the bet, because our side of the wager was a lock!
     I then warned the waiter about how there was no way that he could hold one Carolina Red Chile down, without getting sick!  What I said only made the waiter mad and eager to pounce on the hot pepper eating wager opportunity.
     Carolina Red Chiles are not commercially marketed.  They are relatively unknown and very little information is written about them.  Carolina reds are very spicy when they are mature and red colored.  When Carolina Reds are still green colored, they have a very intense strong "cured tobacco" flavor and they contain much more hot capsicum oil than when they are a mature red color.  Carolina Reds are long thin peppers with a small bell pepper shaped tip.  The heat from a green colored Carolina Red is far more intense than a habanero pepper and the hot pepper flavor lasts much longer!
     The waiter tried to eat the entire green Carolina Red chile pepper at one time, because that was the agreed stipulation of the hot pepper eating wager.  He chewed the hot pepper a few times and this really weird look came over his face!  I have never seen somebody freak out that bad from a hot chile pepper!  He ran to the kitchen sink and was trying to force himself to "throw up" the Carolina Red chile pepper before he had to endure the entire long lasting burning sensation.  Unfortunately for us, the waiter succeeded in expelling the hot green Carolina pepper and whatever else he ate for his last few meals.  The sink was a catastrophe.
     The Mexicans were so cool in that kitchen that we did not even laugh or watch.  We listened!  We just winked at each other and I asked the huge Mexican executive chef to kindly ask the waiter to clean up the mess that he just made in the sink!  The Mexican executive chef walked over to the water and started rubbing his hand on the waiter's back like the waiter was a little baby.  He asked the waiter over and over if he was okay, in a tone of voice that sounded like a dad who was talking to a little baby!  The Mexican chef was saying things like "Poor little baby!  Do you want me to find your mommy?  You poor little thing!"  The Mexican cooks and I could barely keep straight face at this point, but somehow we managed to keep our cool.
     After a chugging down a gallon and a half of cold water and a quart of milk, the waiter was finally able to respond to the chef's question and gasped that he was okay.  The sweaty pale looking waiter said that he had eaten a lot of chile peppers during his lifetime, but he had never eaten a chile pepper that had as much fiery intense spicy heat!
      My response to the waiter was, "Where is our twenty dollars?"  We doubled the wager to $20, if the waiter would agree to eating the entire green Carolina Red chile pepper at one time!  Our side of the wager was a lock!
     After that incident, the Mexican cooks referred to the waiter as the little baby girl!  The Mexican cooks and I never laughed about the waiter getting sick from trying to eat one of the peppers that I was snacking on.  It was more important for us cooks to maintain our cool and keep our bad looks going on!
     Later, the Mexican executive chef asked me what kind of chili pepper I gave to the little baby girl waiter.  I told the chef that it was a green Carolina Red Pepper.  He smiled and asked if he could have a few of my green Carolina peppers!  I said sure!
      The health benefits of hot chile peppers are anti rheumatism, anti arthritic, anti ulcer, strong immune system booster, analgesic, mood elevator, system cleansing, antibiotic, anti parasitic and anti cancer.
      It is the endorphin rush from hot chile peppers that keeps most hot chile pepper heads coming back for more!  I must admit that I do feel much better after eating hot chile peppers.
     This chile pepper ramen recipe is my favorite ultra spice version.  The flavor is nice, if you can stand the heat.  I have made chile ramen recipes with more than 8 pureed orange habanero chiles, with no tomato sauce added a few times.  That recipe is insanely hot!  This blog recipe is not quite as strong as that version.

     Habanero Hot Sauce:

     Ripe orange color habanero peppers can be found at nearly any asian market, Mexican market or regular grocery store.  Wear rubber gloves when handling habaneros, if you have sensitive skin.  This recipe is written in a way that requires minimum direct contact with the habanero peppers.  A food processor, blender or blending wand is required for pureeing this sauce.  The sauce is pureed twice, so it becomes a very smooth consistency.

     Remove the stems from 1/2 pound of orange habanero peppers. 

     Use a knife to slice halfway through each pepper, but do not cut the peppers in half.

     Place the peppers in a stainless steel sauce pot.

     Add enough water to cover the peppers, with 2" of extra water.

     Add 4 cloves of garlic.

     Add 1/4 cup of chopped onion.

     Add 1/2 teaspoon of cumin.

     Add 1 teaspoon of coriander.

     Add 1 1/2 ounces of cider vinegar.

     Add 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil.

     Add 1 teaspoon of sea salt.

     Add 3 pinches of white pepper.

     Place the pot over low heat.

     Allow the ingredients to gently simmer, till the peppers become soft.  (About 1 1/2 to 2 hours.)

     Allow the liquid to reduce.  Only add enough water to keep the peppers covered with 1" of liquid.

     Remove the pot from the heat and allow the ingredients to cool to room temperature.

     Puree the ingredients with an electric blending wand, a food processor or a blender.

     Return the thin puree to the stainless steel pot.

     Place the pot over low heat.

     Gently simmer and reduce the puree, till it becomes a thin puree sauce consistency.

     Remove the pot from the heat and allow the ingredients to cool to room temperature.

     Puree the sauce a second time, so it becomes very smooth.

     The orange habanero hot sauce should look like the finished product photograph above!

     The orange habanero hot sauce has a long shelf life, if the sauce is kept refrigerated.   

     Red Fire Devil Ramen Noodles with Pepitas and Shrimp:
     Heat a sauce pot over low heat.
     Add 2 cups of water.
     Add 1/2 cup of shrimp broth.
     Add 10 dried pequin peppers.  (Bird Peppers)
     Add 1 large dried chopped chipotle pepper.
     Add 1 finely chopped ghost pepper.  (Ghost peppers are the hottest chile peppers on earth, according to many people.  I have had rare tropical peppers that are not listed in any books, that are much hotter!)
     Add 1/4 teaspoon of dried ancho chile powder.
     Add 1/4 of cayenne pepper.
     Add 2 pinches of garlic powder.
     Add 3 pinches of onion powder.
     Add 3 pinches of ground anatto.
     Add 2 pinches of cumin.
     Add sea salt and black pepper.
     Simmer the dried peppers for about twenty minutes, till they become reconstituted.
     Raise the temperature to medium high heat.
     Bring the chile chile broth to a boil.
     Add 1 portion ramen noodles.
     Boil till the ramen noodles become halfway cooked.
     Add 3 large peeled and deveined shrimp.
     Add 1 thick sliced plum tomato.
     Add 1/4 cup of tomato puree.
     Add 1 teaspoon of lime juice.
     Add 2 tablespoon of habanero hot sauce.
     Boil till the noodles become fully cooked.
     Remove the pan from the heat.
     Use tongs to place the sauced ramen noodles in the center of a shallow bowl.
     Place the three shrimp around the ramen noodles.
     Place the tomato slices on the noodles.
     Quickly reduce the sauce, till 1 cup remains.
     Pour the sauce over the noodles.
     Sprinkle two thin sliced green onions over the noodles.
     Sprinkle some toasted pepitas (toasted calabaza seeds) over the noodles.
     Garnish with a parsley sprig.
  
     Yummy and very spicy hot!  The flavor of this nicely seasoned chile pepper recipe does have a lot of chile pepper flavor from the variety of dried peppers in this recipe.
     Everybody has a favorite way to cook their ramen noodles.  This is my favorite way to prepare ramen!  I ate this spicy ramen recipe with a smile on my face.  I did not even need a sip of water!  I really like very spicy hot chile peppers and I am not afraid to post spicy recipes at my food site.  Skip over this recipe if you cannot handle the heat.  Aye chihuahua!  Yum!  ...  Shawna