Faber couple tries taste buds with their hot sauces

By Katie Beth Ryan
The Nelson County Times
Published: June 26, 2008

Nelson County residents need not venture farther south for gourmet hot sauce.

From the garden of their Faber home, Mike and Toni Hobbs grow peppers for their Mike & Toni’s sauces.

The sauces have met the approval of taste buds from as near as Nellysford and as far as south Florida.

Married for six years, the Hobbs said that Mike’s motorcycle accident five years ago left him with frequent sinus infections.

“I was always on prescription decongestants, and three or four times a year, I’d get a good sinus infection,” Mike said. “Then somebody turned me on to the hot peppers, and that took the place of the medicine.”

The couple then dropped in on a friend who was making habanero sauce, and were inspired to make their own. After a couple of less-than-successful attempts, Toni said that “We started developing our own recipe, that just kept changing every time.

“We have a pear tree out back, and one adjustment we made is when we were making a batch, we cooked up some pears. Natural sweetness made a huge difference.”

Currently the Hobbs produce three varieties: Faber Firewater, a gourmet hot sauce named for the Faber firehouse where Mike is a fireman; Obscene Green jalapeno sauce; and Rockfish Rootin’ Tootin’ Habanero Bar-B-Q sauce.