Wonderful shelled pistachios come in a variety of flavors, including BBQ, sea salt and vinegar, and honey roasted. However, the clear favorite—and the one that’s often sold out in stores—is the version that packs the most heat, featuring a seasoning blend that includes garlic, vinegar, and ground red chili peppers.

The seasoning blend is the secret to the great taste of these addictive snacking nuts and to make a hot and sour flavor, you’ll need a few special ingredients. The real thing contains dry tabasco peppers, but the ground tabasco peppers I found were not hot enough for a good clone, so I’m enhancing the formula with ground cayenne pepper. Also, I found that ground tabasco pepper was not as fine as ground cayenne pepper, so I ground it further in a coffee grinder and sifted out the fine powder for the recipe.

For my Wonderful Chili Roasted Pistachios recipe, you’ll also want to grind the nutritional yeast, which adds an umami flavor similar to MSG. Nutritional yeast typically comes in small flakes, and you’ll want to transform it into a fine powder, just like the other ingredients. For a sour flavor that hits all the right notes, you’ll need citric acid (very sour), malic acid (less sour), and powdered vinegar (even less sour), all of which can be found online. If you can't find malic acid, you can replace it with additional citric acid.

After combining the ingredients for the magical seasoning, sprinkle 1¾ teaspoons of the blend over each cup of moistened unsalted pistachios and lightly roast until dry.

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