When you think of Queen Elizabeth II you probably don’t think of the food she loved. The Queen was a fan of British classics like chocolate sponge cake Earl Grey tea and Sunday roast. But perhaps surprisingly she was also a fan of the quintessential American hot sauce Tabasco sauce.
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Former Royal Chef Reveals Queen Elizabeth's Favourite Meal and the One Thing She Hates
The love affair apparently goes back a long way as noted in Frederick John Corbitt the Queen's deputy controller of supplies in his 1956 memoir "My Twenty Years In Buckingham Palace." He writes that during World War II the Queen Mother's staff searched high and low for Tabasco sauce to use in a lobster cocktail she regularly consumed. It proved difficult to obtain due to shortages but the staff managed to get it. It is unclear whether Queen Elizabeth grew up in a household that loved Tabasco sauce or developed a taste for it in some other way. Interestingly the BBC reported in 2000 that she "banned all dishes that were too spicy or exotic." Perhaps Tabasco sauce was just right for her taste and not considered too extreme.
The Queen granted Tabasco a Royal Warrant in 2009 which is a major achievement. To earn a Royal Warrant a company or individual must demonstrate excellence in quality and performance and provide goods or services to the Royal Family for at least five years. And the brand or individual must continue to prove that they are worthy of the recognition.
The queen may have given Tabasco her seal of approval but Americans have long known that the iconic Louisiana-made hot sauce was something special. The most popular origin story begins on Avery Island Louisiana in 1868 when Edmund McIlhenny found some peppers growing near his Gulf Coast home. He came up with the recipe (basically Tabasco peppers vinegar and salt) and started making batches. The product quickly caught on and became even more popular when modernization made larger-scale production of the hot sauce possible.
