David Ashley, firing up the grill in his Sudbury backyard, is founder and chief chemist of one of the world's hottest hot sauce companies, with dozens of concoctions to his credit. (Photos by Joanne rathe/globe staff) When you're hot, you're hot By Susan Chaityn Lebovits August 10, 2008 Walk beyond the computers and fax machines in the Sudbury office of David Ashley and you'll find a rudimentary science lab. Turmeric, clove, beer buds, Serrano pepper powder, and extracts such as natural butter and mango fill the shelves of an old metal cabinet. Thirteen glass bottles in varying shades of orange are lined up across a tabletop, the result of gastronomic tinkering that may soon wind up on supermarket shelves across the nation. Ashley, founder and chief alchemist for the Ashley Food Co., has been creating barbecue and hot sauces for nearly two decades. The 57-year-old has 21 products under his name, produces sauces for 12 other companies, and has sold 1.2 million bottles of one concoction or another. "I started tinkering with sauces in 1985 in my Brighton apartment," said Ashley. "All of my friends told me that I should bottle and sell it." After six years of cooking gallons of sauces and pouring them into fruit-juice jars, he decided to take the plunge, incorporate, and find professional space. Some of his sauces have taken weeks to perfect, he said, and others are created entirely in his head. "I once had a dream to make a molasses-based hot sauce, which I don't think anyone had ever done at the time," said Ashley. "It was both cool yet extremely hot, and had nice textures." His first business break came from a woman working at Le Saucier, a gourmet shop in Boston's Faneuil Hall Marketplace, who urged him to make a hot sauce for the store. He named it "Dave's Insanity." While working on another sauce that he named Inferno, Ashley traversed Greater Boston searching for herbs and spices until he found the perfect clove powder at an Indian market in Central Square in Cambridge. He took his creation to the Fancy Food Show, which is put on by the National Association for the Specialty Food Trade, and signed a deal with a restaurant owner who had an enormous Bloody Mary bar that offered 200 varieties of hot sauces. The restaurant's owner, Chip Hearne, went on to start Peppers.com, and is one of Ashley's biggest customers, selling hot sauce via the Internet to 35 countries around the world. In 1995, Ashley's Inferno was declared the hottest hot sauce on the market, based on the findings of a professional taster. Ashley's racked up 89,566 Scoville heat units, a system developed in 1912 for grading the pungency of chili peppers. Charlie Schandelmayer, owner of Sauce Crafters Inc. in Florida, who bottles Ashley's sauces, said the plant's atmosphere can get rather spicy. "You're talking about producing sauces that in many cases are hotter than a can of defense spray," said Schandelmayer. "When you start to mix the sauce in the beginning of the day it kicks little micros into the air and becomes like pepper spray in the plant; the UPS guy will walk in at 10 a.m. to make a delivery and start coughing and choking." Ashley said one of his favorite sauces is Green Amigo, which has fresh jalapeños, onions, garlic, and fresh cilantro and lime juice. His sauces range in price from $5 to $45; the top price will buy a 1.7-ounce bottle of 357 Mad Dog Pepper Extract. One of Ashley's more memorable business moments involved the time he ordered key chains with a metal bullet to hang from the neck of his "357 Magnum" bottles, and learned, after delivery, that the bullet opened up to reveal a cocaine spoon. Stuck with many cases of nonrefundable key chains, Ashley hit upon the idea of marketing the sauce as the only one to come with its own tasting spoon. "Lo and behold, it became a cult thing," said Ashley. "The Germans in Europe love this product." But he also received calls from his distributors saying that some customers had been arrested for selling drug paraphernalia. His 357 Mad Dog Silver Edition sauce is now one of the hottest in the world, boasting 750,000 Scoville units. Ashley grew up on the south side of Chicago, the son of social activists who, Ashley said, were both jailed in the 1940s for defending civil rights. "At 7 days old I took part in my first peace march called 'Ban the Bomb' with the Committee for Non-Violent Action," said Ashley. The family moved into a tiny apartment in New York City so Ashley could attend P.S. 6, known as one of the best public schools. "I could never read out loud, and didn't like to speak in public," said Ashley, who struggled with dyslexia. "I barely got out of high school and it was torture." He attended the High School for Art and Design in Manhattan, and worked in an art supply store and did their window designs before moving to California. In line to be drafted for the Vietnam War, he was given conscientious objector status, and moved to Boston to fulfill his alternative-service requirement, working at Children's Hospital as a groundskeeper. He also studied macrobiotics, was a caretaker for a home in the Berkshires, and bought and sold phased-out stereo equipment. While in the Berkshires, a friend suggested that he go see Alice Brock, owner of Alice's Restaurant in Stockbridge (made famous by the Arlo Guthrie song) to sell her a stereo. He did, and wound up living with her and managing the restaurant for a little under a year. When the couple split up he moved back to New York and took a number of odd jobs, including as a drum roadie for Kool and the Gang. After numerous other jobs in the music business, Ashley went back to his job at Children's and began mixing his sauces on the side. "David is the sultan of hot sauce," said Christopher McCarthy, a senior vice president for State Street Investors who also runs websites selling hot sauces. He credits Ashley with jump-starting his business and teaching him the ropes. "There's no holding back with David. He'll show you everything you want to see." For more on Ashley's sauces, visit ashleyfoods.com. To suggest a subject for the People column, e-mail Lebovits@globe.com. © Copyright 2008 Globe Newspaper Company. Pepper 'kills prostate cancer' Pepper 'kills prostate cancer' Jalapeno peppers are used to flavour chilli The ingredient which makes jalapeno peppers hot also makes prostate cancer cells commit suicide, a study suggests. Tests showed that capsaicin triggered 80% of the cells to start the process leading to cell death. The US research in the journal Cancer Research also found tumours treated with capsaicin were smaller. UK prostate experts say capsaicin could be the basis of a future drug but warned eating too many hot peppers has been linked to stomach cancer. We caution men with prostate cancer in the UK against upping their weekly intake of the hottest known chillies Chris Hiley, The Prostate Cancer Charity In the study, researchers from Cedars-Sinai Medical Center studied mice who had been genetically modified to have human prostate cancer cells. They were given a dose of pepper extract equivalent to a man of 200 pounds (90.7kg) taking 400 milligrams of capsaicin three times a week. That would be the same as having between three and eight fresh habanero peppers - the highest rated peppers for capsaicin content. Normal cells go through a constant process where millions die every second - a process called apoptosis - while millions more are made, to keep the numbers the same. But cancer cells avoid that process and "dodge" apoptosis by mutating or deregulating the genes that participate in programmed cell suicide. Capsaicin was seen to increase the amount of certain proteins involved in the apoptosis process. Capsaicin also reduced the amount of prostate-specific antigen (PSA), a protein whch is often produced in high quantities by prostate tumours. Fish intake Dr Soren Lehmann, who led the study, said: "Capsaicin had a profound anti-proliferative effect on human prostate cancer cells in culture. "It also dramatically slowed the development of prostate tumours." Chris Hiley, head of policy and research at The Prostate Cancer Charity, said: "This is interesting laboratory-based work on cells but we don't yet know how, if at all, it might help men with prostate cancer. "Eventually, it may be possible to extract the capsaicin and make it available as a drug treatment. "In the meantime we caution men with prostate cancer in the UK against upping their weekly intake of the hottest known chillies - high intake of hot chillies has been linked with stomach cancers in the populations of India and Mexico. "For now, if men with prostate cancer want to improve their diet they should avoid fatty foods, eat less red and processed meat, increase their fish intake and enjoy a wide and plentiful range of fruit and vegetables every day." BBC News March 15, 2006 Hot Peppers Really Do Bring The Heat Chili peppers can do more than just make you feel hot, reports a study in the August 1 Journal of Biological Chemistry; the active chemical in peppers can directly induce thermogenesis, the process by which cells convert energy into heat. Capsaicin is the chemical in chili peppers that contributes to their spiciness; CPS stimulates a receptor found in sensory neurons, creating the heat sensation and subsequent reactions like redness and sweating. Now, Yasser Mahmoud has found that capsaicin can create "heat" in a more direct manner by altering the activity of a muscle protein called SERCA. Normally, muscle contraction initiates following the release of a wave of calcium ions from a compartment called the sarcoplasmic reticulum (SR); SERCA then actively pumps the calcium back into the SR (using ATP energy), causing muscle relaxation and renewing the cycle. Capsaicin, however, can attach to SERCA and "uncouple" this pumping activity; that is, the protein still burns ATP energy but doesn't use it to pump calcium. Instead, all the ATP energy is given off as heat. This uncoupling, known as thermogenesis, is one important method of staying warm and is most often seen in hibernating animals. Mahmoud notes that capsaicin is the first natural compound known to augment the thermogenesis process . These findings further explain how capsaicin intake can increase metabolism and body temperature. And although these studies required relatively high amounts of capsaicin (probably more than someone could eat), the structure of capsaicin could be used as a model to design more potent compounds that might have clinical use such as treating hypothermia. "Capsaicin stimulates uncoupled ATP hydrolysis by sarcoplasmic reticulum calcium pump" Yasser Ahmed Mahmmoud Journal of Biological Chemistry Click here to view article online American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Article URL: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/117499.php He brings the heat to cooking Chrtistian Science Monitor - June 27, 2007 Self-taught chef David Ashley stokes America's appetite for hot sauce. By Jennifer Wolcott | Correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor Sudbury, Mass. Never before have I tasted hot sauce off a toothpick. But when my mouth caught fire 10 seconds after tasting "Inferno," one of the hottest of hot sauces in the world, I understood why David Ashley, maker of Mad Dog hot sauces, had urged me to sample his sauce with a toothpick rather than the plastic minispoon I'd used to taste his other, milder sauces. He also insisted – in a stern but kind tone – that I place the toothpick in the center of my tongue, by all means avoiding my lips and the tip of my tongue. He also placed a tall glass of milk in front of me, explaining that a swig of milk is the best way to cool off the burn. He's done this before, I realized. I wasn't his first victim. There must have been some hapless tasters in the past who had pursed the toothpick between their lips and regretted it. Ah, yes, I noted: Each of his colorful, playfully self-illustrated sauce labels features a warning. Some are light-hearted ("Not for pussycats"), and others downright dire: "Warning: This sauce is very hot – use it at your own risk." "What other business allows you to torture people for a living?" he jokes. "Inferno" is not even the hottest of Mr. Ashley's line of 15 bottled sauces, which he launched in his kitchen in 1985 at the urging of friends who couldn't get enough of his homemade barbecue sauce. He also produces a sauce dubbed "357" for its 357,000 Scoville heat units – a scientific grading system for the heat intensity of chili peppers. That's a big leap from Inferno's 89,000 "Scovilles," as industry insiders call them. Though he's turned on the heat since his early days at the stove, Ashley's favorite is his more tame "Green Amigo," a blend of habanero peppers, onions, garlic, cilantro, vinegar, and lime juice, which one can eat by the spoonful. "It's an everyday sauce that's great with anything, especially eggs," he says. But as long as the market demands tongue-scorching sauces like 357, this self-described chief alchemist and founder of Ashley Food Co. plans to deliver. "It doesn't have to be hot to be great," he says. "But because lots of people want it hotter and hotter, I respond to that. I have to go where the market goes." Already this year his company has sold $100,000 worth of Mad Dog 357: The demand for heat shows no signs of cooling. Ashley says it's partly just a "macho thing," where people want to show how well they can handle spicy blends of habanero, jalapeño, or Scotch bonnet peppers. The popularity may also have something to do with consumers' heightened tolerance for highly spiced foods as a result of increased world travel and exposure to ethnic cuisines at home, where the restaurant scene has become more diverse than ever. Whatever is driving demand, responding to the market has served Ashley well over the years. When the hot-sauce trend was really sizzling in the 1990s, he was selling to about 2,200 stores worldwide. He now sells through 200 large distributors, not stores, but overall it amounts to a slight decrease in sales. Ashley attributes that to "a funky economy" and also his shifting priorities. In addition to running his own business out of his basement in a Boston suburb, he has a wife (who can't stand hot sauce) and a 9-year-old son (an avid fan). He's spending more time at the baseball field these days – but has no plans to shelve the sauce. His eyes grow big when he talks about ideas for the future, such as a mellower line that might include dipping, glazing, and marinating sauces. Ashley doesn't have a culinary school degree. His entree into the food world was less conventional. In 1976, his then-girlfriend Alice Brock asked him to run Alice's Restaurant (of Arlo Guthrie song fame) in Stockbridge, Mass. It was during his short but grueling stint there, says Ashley, that he learned the value of cooking with fresh, natural, high-quality ingredients. Ashley says he's scoured the globe for the best vinegars, tamari, herbs, and spices. Cook's Illustrated Magazine crowned his barbecue sauce the "Original Best in USA"; Southern Living called the same sauce the "Best Bottled BBQ Sauce." In 2002, his Mad Cat Hot Sauce garnered First Place, Habanero Hot Sauce, at the Scovie Awards hosted by Fiery Foods & Barbecue Magazine. He has even collaborated with rock stars, most recently advising Aerosmith's Joe Perry when he launched his own hot sauce, and Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead with his line of wok sauces. But he says he no longer feels the need to chase after awards, hobnob with rock stars, or travel the globe. His favorite source of herbs and spices is a tiny Indian market a few miles away. He is a connoisseur of local restaurants, and he most enjoys staying home, grilling with his family on his back deck. Of course, a bottle of Green Amigo is never far away, nor is a stash of his original barbecue sauce, reminding him of his 17-year journey as an entrepreneur. "Everyone thought my barbecue sauce was great," he says. "Of course, you start thinking that 'Hey, maybe I'll make a quick million bucks doing this.' " But it hasn't been that easy. For most hot sauce producers, he explains, "the market went sky high, but then you realize you can't make a living selling sauce for $6 per bottle at the mall." More than the financial ups and downs, he adds, is the strain on family life that can come with running one's own business. "It's been a lot of fun, going to the trade shows and all," he says. "But if I had it to do over again, knowing what I know today, I'd think really hard about it." Clearly the Mad Dog in David Ashley has mellowed, and the time is ripe for this alchemist to head back into his lab and mix up those more subdued sauces. Before long, Teriyaki for Pussycats just might share a shelf with Mad Dog 357. Homemade hot sauce Commercial hot-sauce maker David Ashley is understandably reluctant to say how he makes the sauces he sells. But he's generous about listing ingredients and urges home chefs to experiment: Use more cilantro, less, or none; add unsulfured molasses; dry or prepared mustard; try a blend of different chilies. 5 chili peppers of your choice (see story on 'heat' below): jalapeño, habanero, Scotch bonnet, or some other, deseeded (wear rubber gloves) and chopped 3 to 5 cloves garlic, chopped 1 small onion, chopped 1/2 cup cilantro, or more to taste (optional) 1/2 cup good-quality, red wine vinegar Juice of one lemon 1/4 teaspoon salt Combine ingredients in a food processor and process until liquefied. Transfer mixture to saucepan and bring to a boil. Simmer for 10 minutes. Let cool and then put sauce into sterilized glass containers. Yield: about 2 cups. Sauce will keep for several weeks in refrigerator. - from David Ashley How hot is 'hot'? The Scoville heat unit (SHU) was developed by American chemist Wilbur Scoville in 1912 as a way to compare the 'heat' or piquancy of chili peppers. The perception of heat is a measure of how much capsaicin is present. The original test found how many times a unit of pepper extract had to be diluted in sugar water before its piquancy was undetectable by a panel of tasters. On the Scoville scale, a sweet or bell pepper, which has no capsaicin, rates a 0. A habanero pepper, though, has an SHU of 200,000 or more, meaning that it has to be diluted by a factor of 200,000 before its heat is no longer detectable. Some sample ratings (in SHUs): 2,000,000-5,300,000: Standard US-grade pepper spray 350,000-577,000: Red Savina habanero 100,000-350,000: Scotch bonnet 50,000-100,000: Thai pepper, malagueta pepper, chiltepin pepper 30,000-50,000: Cayenne pepper, ají pepper, tabasco pepper 10,000-23,000: Serrano pepper 2,500-8,000: Jalapeño pepper 2,500-5,000: Tabasco sauce 1,000-1,500: Poblano pepper 100-500: Pimento Source: Wikipedia; The Pepper Encyclopedia www.csmonitor.com | Copyright © 2007 The Christian Science Monitor. All rights reserved. Red-hot chili peppers Sauces Boston Phoenix Spetember 6, 2003 Click HERE to read. Putting his money with his mouth is... Putting his money with his mouth is...By Patrick Golden / Tribune Staff Writer Thursday, July 3, 2003. Click HERE to read. Playing With Fire Playing with fire: Food Network films segment in Waltham on creator of guitarist Joe Perry's hot sauce - Waltham Daily News Tribune July 3, 2003. Click HERE to read. Boston Globe Some Like It Very Hot Boston Globe article about supper hot sauces and Ashley Food Company. Click HERE to read. Mad Dog Sauces for U.S. Special Forces stationed in Afghanistan Dedham, Massachusetts, April 15, 2002--Ashley Food Company, Inc.- Markers of Mad Dog, Mad Cat and Idiot Boyz hot sauces, at the request of Chapter 38, Special Forces Association has made a donation of their products to U.S. Special Forces stationed in Afghanistan. According to John Senatore, moral support officer, Chapter 38, Special Forces Association "We need some hot sauce to make their meals taste better". David Ashley, President of Ashley Food Co. Inc. announced that the company along with Sauce Crafters Inc. had sent 94 cases of Freedom sauce as well as an assortment of 25 cases of the other hot sauces that Ashley Food and Sauce Crafters make. Freedom sauce, according to Ashley was created to raise money for the victims of 9/11 by Ashley Food and Sauce Crafters. Among the other products sent was 357 Mad Dog, billed as "The Hottest Sauce In The World", Mad Cat, Green Amigo, Idiot Boyz, Colon Cleaner, Rectal Rocket Fuel and Widow No Survivors. Ashley Food Company hopes that in some small way this lends support to our men and women risking their lives to stop the worldwide menace of terrorism. Great Books "Dante's Inferno" on The Learning Channel Mad Dog Inferno Hot Sauce was featured in a Cronkite Ward & Roland House feature on " Great Books" Inferno on February 16th, 2002 10 PM EST on TLC.