ChilliBOM Maker Stories
13 Angry Scorpions patrick beresford
Meet Patrick Beresford
Maker of 13 Angry Scorpions Hot Sauces
From chronic pain to award winning hot sauce maker.
We have always had a passion for good food and great hot sauce, but our careers always kept us too busy.
In 2013 everything changed when I suffered a spinal injury. It cost me a successful career with one of Australia's biggest mining companies and left me with severe chronic pain at a time my son William was just 6 months old. I spent the next 4 years trying to learn how to live with chronic pain and battling depression from losing almost everything. At some point I realised that I had to do something to take my life and my family's future back.
"I used to create hot sauce recipes on my days off from working at the aluminium smelter."
How did you get started?
So in 2017, my wife Jessica and I decided to use some of my old hot sauce recipes to try and help make ends meet. These were recipes I'd created years before, on my days off from working at the aluminium smelter. We made our first batch and sold them at a local market and were so stoked to sell 15 bottles. That small success gave us the impetus to push forward.
Starting from scratch, together, we created a range of new sauces and built our brand around them.
How do you get '13 Angry Scorpions' to taste so good?
We blend our peppers in a vat of distilled vinegar to age and mellow for 18 months, giving our range of small-batch hot sauces their unique, rich flavour profiles.
We now have 5 sauces - ranging from a mild Chipotle BBQ Sauce - which even the children can eat - all the way up to some scorching sauces. My favourite sauce is the Jekyll & Hyde, that's our Freakishly Hot - Moruga Scorpion and Chipotle Sauce.
You guys keep winning awards!
In the last two and a half years we have won 15 food industry awards, including 11 of Australia's biggest hot sauce awards including the Mr Chilli Awards.
In the last 18 months, our flagship sauce Jekyll & Hyde has won four of the most coveted hot sauce awards in the USA including World Champion in Louisiana at the World Hot Sauce Awards, 1st Place at the Scovie Awards, 1st Place at the Spicy Flave Awards in Wisconsin.
And just three months ago we were awarded the silver medal in Texas, at the Texas Fiery Food Challenge. We're still a very small family business with big dreams, so the continued support we receive from our loyal customers, like Rod at ChilliBOM is as important as ever.
Rapid Fire Questions!
Sweet or savoury? Savoury
Beer or wine? Whiskey!
Dog or cat? Definitely my Staffy's Bully and Zoe.
Camping or binge TV? Camping at the beach.
How often do you eat hot sauce? I eat at least one of our sauces with almost every meal, sometimes a combination of two different sauces depending on what I'm eating.
On a heat scale 1 – 10 where do you sit? I'd probably say about six or seven.
What's your favourite thing you're eating right now? My favourite meals to eat our sauces with are Mexican and Low & Slow barbecue (brisket or short ribs). Click on the recipe card to get our delicious recipe.