DAVE DEWITT IS "UP TO HERE" IN RED CHILE SAUCE - Sunny travels to Albuquerque to interview Dave DeWitt, publisher and editor of Fiery Foods Magazine.

'Twas the night before Christmas
Chef Dave DeWitt was a mess
Red chile sauce clung to his chin and his chest
Mama, dressed in a green chile gown,
Was all snuggled in bed
While visions of hot peppers heated her head
Chile stockings had been hung by the chimney with care
Knowing that Chile Claus would soon be there
The Old Man preferred spicy pork tamales
It's the only thing left, he said, that gave him his jollies
But the pork never thawed, it was still in the freezer
The cornhusks were missing along with dog Geezer
The Chef fretted wringing his hands raw
This Christmas he worried he'd get nothing at all.
And the pantry was empty of cayenne and pasilla,
The pods needed for Christmas Day in Mesilla.
But just when DeWitt was ready to concede
There was a clatter on the roof and the sound of speed
Away to the window he flew like a flash
Tore open the shutter and threw up the sash
When what to his wondering eyes should appear
But a miniature sleigh led by eight Chile Deer
Each carried tamales and peppers galore
Which they gave to the Chef - New Mexico's Chile Conquistador.
"We Chileheads stick together!" Chile Clause said with glee
As DeWitt wiped a tear showing indeed he'd agree
"Now Serrano! Now Aji! Now, Habanero and Serrano!
On Pimento, On Tepin, On Thai and Poblano!
There's more chile to give and cheer to impart
Feliz Navidad all! It's time to depart!
----------Sunny Conley

Dave DeWitt and I chile rendezvoused on an August day in his Albuquerque office. DeWitt is the publisher of Fiery Foods Magazine (http://www.fiery-foods.com), a colorful glossy bimonthly trade journal with a distribution of 15,000. "We can meet before my morning cup of V-8 juice doused with hot sauce," he emailed. On the day of our fiery tryst I refueled first at a nearby Mexican ma and pa joint, savoring huevos rancheros, refried beans and a basket of warm tortillas. As soon as I mopped my plate clean with a remaining hunk of tortilla, I headed out the door to meet "Mr. Hot."
DeWitt, considered one of the world's foremost authorities on chile peppers and hot and spicy foods, has authored and co-authored more than 30 books. He was nominated for a James Beard Award in 1995 for his tome A World of Curries. My favorite DeWitt cookbook, however, is The Whole Chile Pepper [Little, Brown, 1990, $19.95] which is jammed with 180 easy to prepare hot and spicy recipes and scads of legend and lore. (Another plus for this aging baby boomer is that it's written in large print.)
Dave DeWitt was one of the first Southwest food writers I met in ink when I moved to the Land of Enchantment a decade ago. At the time he was editor-in-chief of Chile Pepper magazine. Actually, it was DeWitt and pal Nancy Gerlach, who founded the magazine in 1988 before selling out 8 years later to a Texas publisher. Chile Pepper began with a circulation of 212 and grew to 85,000.
Today DeWitt uses his entrepreneurial skills to publish Fiery Foods Magazine. "Unlike Chile Peppers, this magazine gets into the 'meat of the chile'," says DeWitt, a handsome, bald gent with a vivacious disposition. "We can get a lot more into depth about the pod - agriculture, manufacturing, retailing, importing and exporting. Dave and his wife, Mary Jane Wilan, also founded the National Fiery Foods [trade] Show, now in its 11th year. Chileheads from the world over look forward to this annual event.
Dave met his long time cookbook writing companion, Nancy Gerlach, at a video store in the early 1980s. "Nancy and her husband owned Albuquerque's first video store and I owned one of the first video tape machines. I used to go to their store to rent videos. We started a friendship and Nancy and I soon learned that we had two things in common: fondness for chiles and cooking. I've been a home cook for a long time."
        DeWitt's interest in chile piqued after he vacationed and later moved to New Mexico in the 1970s.  He just finished grad school at the University of Richmond in Virginia and "was determined to start a freelance writing career." His background includes college teaching, radio and television, the latter two of which DeWitt says helps him promote the magazine, books and trade shows.
"When I moved here, I was fascinated how chile was so much a part of New Mexico's culture and that the average family would buy 40 pounds of green chile a year and roast and peel them. I don't think there's any other state where the vegetable or the fruit is worshiped as much as our chile," DeWitt daid.  "And what surprised me was how little information there was on chile peppers.  There were no books. There were some recipes scattered here and there. I found a few articles that had been written back in the 1940s. So I took a chance as a freelance writer. I decided to specialize and write only about chile peppers."
In the early 1980s DeWitt and Gerlach teamed up to author Fiery Cuisines published in 1984. "I was primarily in charge of research. She was in charge of recipes. Then we came up with the idea for a magazine devoted exclusively to hot and spicy foods." The business partners presented their proposal to Robert Spiegel, who had recently started a publishing company in Albuquerque. He liked the idea, and in 1987, The Whole Chile Pepper Catalog, was published. "It was suppose to be a one-shot deal, just one issue. But readers liked it so much that some of them sent us blank checks with a note saying they'd like to subscribe."
As a result, Chile Pepper magazine debuted in 1988. In the meantime DeWitt and Gerlach published "our biggest chile book ever - The Whole Chile Pepper Book (Little, Brown, 1990). It was an enormous hit and we followed that with numerous other books."
 That same year DeWitt and Wilan attended a New Mexico Chile Conference in Las Cruces. "That's when we realized there was this whole industry out there. It didn't have a magazine and it didn't have a trade show."  Later, the couple launched the Fiery Foods Magazine along with the National Fiery Foods Show, which Wilan now heads. Since then, the DeWitts have traveled the world to research and sample the cuisine and culture of other countries. "It's been a fascinating experience," DeWitt says.
"Mr. Hot" claims he never runs out of material to write about the chile mojo. "The more research I do, the more I find. It's not a fad. The chile pepper has conquered Middle America. It's not just for an isolated group. It's been mainstreamed and that's why its popularity continues to grow. It's taken awhile to educate people about the pod. And there's so much to like about chile. It doesn't have any fat. It's low in calories and cholesterol and high in fiber. When it's green it's loaded with Vitamin C; when it turns red it's pumped with vitamin A. Chile doesn't have to be hot to be appreciated."
DeWitt's schedule is seemingly endless. He and two of his staff members, Melissa T. Stock and Kellye Hunter just released The Healing Powers of Peppers [Three Rivers Press, 1998, $12], which is a hot seller this Christmas. It contains "quirky bits of trivia," personal testimonies, folk remedies and unique and healthy recipes including Orange Habanero Soup, Fat Free Nectarine Soup, Indonesian Eggplant Curry and Cold and Hot Fruit Salad. Andrew T. Weil, M.D., the author of Spontaneous Healing, wrote the foreword.
In the works are three 45 minute documentaries that DeWitt is producing in conjunction with the Chile Pepper Institute at NMSU. Heat Up Your Life includes segments on Peppers and People, From Seed to Salsa and Chile Pepper Cuisine. The documentaries, says DeWitt, are "Discovery Channel material" that explains how human beings and chile peppers have interacted with one another for 10,000 years. In the spring, DeWitt's 500 page Chile Encyclopedia will be released, the largest encyclopedia of its kind with an "avante garde cover," he says with pride. The DeWitts, who claim a staff of 8, "including us," work every day. It's work but it's fun, especially now that chile has conquered the world!"

I do believe I have a cough coming on...

Hot Herbal Cough Syrup (from the Healing Powers of Chile)

This is a remedy for persistent coughs. Take it in 1 tablespoon doses every hour as long as the coughing persists.

1/2 teaspoon hot chile powder, such as habanero, pequin, or cayenne
1 cup fresh lemon juice
6 garlic cloves, minced
1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
1/4 cup sugar or honey

Place all the ingredients in a blender and puree. Store in a clean jar and refrigerate.