Iberia Parish, Louisiana, USA (March 2007)
Tabasco peppers grow commercially in several places including Louisiana, Central America and South America, but the bottling of the famous Tabasco® Sauce traces to only one location: Avery Island, deep in the heart of Louisiana’s Cajun country (map)
Making the Sauce
This sign welcomes visitors to the McIlhenny Company’s Tabasco® Sauce facility. Peppers age and ferment in oak barrels for several years, much like the barrel seen in the photograph above. The factory gets used barrels from whiskey distilleries and then cleans and refurbishes them. Salt mined from Avery Island’s vast natural deposits form a thick layer on top of each barrel. This creates an airlock that allows gases formed by fermentation to escape while blocking any possible contamination from the outside world. After proper aging, workers strain the concoction, mixed it with vinegar to the right proportion, then bottle and ship it worldwide.
The Factory
All of the action takes place in the Tabasco® processing plant. The buildings look vintage but in fact they trace back only a couple of decades. Designers made them feel old while they function in a thoroughly modern way. They replaced earlier buildings now used as office space. As you arrive at the parking lot you can immediately smell a slight tinge of pepper and vinegar. It’s a pleasant odor, not overwhelming, but it’s very distinctly Tabasco®.
Bottling and Beyond
Bottling Line
Tabasco® Bottling Lines
Tabasco® Sauce whizzes by on bottling lines. Every bottle produced by the McIlhenny Company will roll along these lines where being filled and packaged. In this photograph above, the bottles can be seen on the left part of the near line and the middle line. According to handwritten signs on a display window, this run of habanero sauce would go to China.
The McIlhenny Company also provided a “country story” next to their factory. It sells every conceivable Tabasco® accessory and food item imaginable.
You may also be interested in visiting my Jungle Gardens of Avery Island page.
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