preserving sauce in a bottle

I'm making a sauce to put on my hot dogs, however, does anyone know how to preserve it in a bottle to sell? Furthermore how long is the shelf life for a bottled sauce?

Making, bottling, and selling a sauce requires a lot of steps, frequently involving additional inspections and permits by state usda (for intrastate sales) and FDA (for interstate sales) of the production facilities and review of your HAACP. It is usually cheaper to contract with a production company to do the cooking and bottling of a "home-made" sauce.

Preservation of a sauce involves the combination of proper Ph levels, heating, and sealing in a contamination free environment using proper sterile technique. Canning techniques -- which is what you are talking about doing -- can be learned from your local extension agency. Improperly performed, the biggest and most frequent danger is botulism.

You will also need seperate insurance that will cover you from liability from problems in your pre-packaged food product.

To get away from the expense and headache of bottling your sauce, you can always sell the product fresh, not pre-packaged. For example, I sell my various bbq sauces to customers in pint bottles. When a customer orders the sauce, I put it into the bottle fresh from the current bulk batch, which I whip up three times weekly. Doing it that way eliminates any additional permits or commercial kitchen inspections by agencies other than the local health district.

Years ago I got in a discussion with a fellow chef. He had a lug of tomatos that were at the point it was make sauce or lose them. He decided to make a big batch of samsa for the bar. His idea was just make it and seal it tightly in maon jars. No heat no nuthin', just make, pour and seal. I advised him that it needed to be acnned as it would go bad if it wasnt pastuerized. He poo-poo'ed me saying that the acidity would prevent spoiling. It never got to a botullism issue as they fermented and cracked the jars fairly quickly!
britt

Bottling is very dangerous liability. You have to bottle under pressure with a pressure cooker + 200f heat for a certain period of time. Ph level has alot to do with safety as well. Pickles are alot safer to jar due to acidity of vinegar.

Bottling and selling is a commercial operation. There are post that can be searched on the board about this. Basically you need to find a commercial operation that will take your recipe and make any adjustments to it to survive shelf life. Then they will bottle and take a cut of the profits. RJF

RJF was spot on again! To process something requires a license totally different from a regular food operation. (You thought getting a cart or vendors license was hard, try to bottle something). Most people outsource this stage (you give them the recipe and they do the cooking and bottling). Takes a bit of equipment to satisfy the Health Dept. here... A good person to contact, and one can probably answer the finer details is BuddyRoadhouse here in the forums. Either way, I wish ya the best of luck!

Wowdogs,
I have gone through this process just this year. Do a search on this forum for lots of great tips. It sure helped me out. You should really use a co-packer to do this. It will take some time to get it done and some money. I found a co-packer that was willing to do a 50 gallon minimum. Most other places I found wanted at least a 500 gallon minimum.
We started this process at the end of last year and we got our first shipment in May, so be patient if you decide to do this.
I have recieved lots of good help and suggestions on this forum, don't be afraid to ask if your serious about doing this. Feel free to PM me with any questions.

quote:

Originally posted by wowdogs

I'm making a sauce to put on my hot dogs, however, does anyone know how to preserve it in a bottle to sell? Furthermore how long is the shelf life for a bottled sauce?

What kind of sauce is it and would you share the recipe?...Russ

Russ, Wowdogs said on another thread that he had a secret sauce. Maybe he would give a good description without giving away his secrets?
Joe