Small-batch hot sauce · Austin, Texas

Put on your Sunday Best.

Peppers picked, fire-roasted and hand-bottled by the Castillo family since 1974 — still stirred in a pot big enough to give a beagle a bath.

Shop the Sauces Our Story
  • No shortcuts
  • Texas-grown peppers
  • Ships nationwide
Sunday Best FRONT PORCH FIRE
A faded, sepia-toned photograph from the Sunday Best family archive

Ruby & Earl, East Austin — summer '74

FAMILY RECIPE ★ SMALL BATCH ★ AUSTIN TX ★ EST. 1974
Our Story

Born at the Sunday supper table

Back in the spring of 1974, Ruby Castillo had a habit: after church, she'd set out a little jar of her habanero-mango sauce next to the brisket. By summer, the neighbors were showing up to Sunday supper with empty jars of their own.

Her husband Earl hand-lettered a few labels, talked his way onto the counter at Pruitt's Feed & Seed on South Congress, and sold the first forty bottles for 75 cents apiece. They called it Sunday Best, because that's what Ruby always said it was.

Fifty years on, their grandkids run the kitchen on Old Lockhart Road. The labels got a little fancier. The recipe didn't change one bit.

  • 50+years of Sunday suppers
  • 3generations of Castillos
  • 40gallons per batch — no more
The Pantry Shelf

Four sauces, no fillers

From a gentle Sunday morning to a full-on fire-and-brimstone sermon. Every bottle is filled, capped and labeled by hand.

$85 oz
Sunday Best SUNDAY MORNING

Jalapeño & Wildflower Honey

Sunday Morning

Green, bright and sweet as a hymn. Made for eggs, biscuits and folks who sing alto.

$95 oz
Sunday Best CHURCH PICNIC

Smoked Chipotle & Tomato

Church Picnic

Smoky, tangy, and polite enough for the potluck. Bring it to the brisket and it'll stay for pie.

The 1974 Original
$105 oz
Sunday Best FRONT PORCH FIRE

Habanero & Mango

Front Porch Fire

Ruby's very first recipe. Fruity up front, then the heat pulls up a rocking chair and stays a while.

$128 oz jar
Sunday Best HELLFIRE JELLY

Ghost Pepper & Hill Country Peach

Hellfire & Brimstone

A sticky-sweet pepper jelly with a sermon at the end. Spoon it over cream cheese and repent later.

The Whole Congregation

All four, packed in a pine crate with Ruby's recipe card. $34 — and shipping's on us.

From the Mailbag

Letters we keep on the fridge

Folks have been writing to us since the days of the 13-cent stamp. We read every single one.

Post Card

Dear Sunday Best folks — my daddy kept a bottle of Front Porch Fire in his pickup's glovebox from 1979 until the day he sold that truck. I just ordered my first case. Some things are worth keeping.

Darlene P.Lubbock, Texas
Post Card

To the Castillo family — we put Church Picnic out at our wedding barbecue and three guests begged for the recipe. I told them it was a family secret. It's your family's secret, but still.

Marcus & JunePortland, Oregon
Ruby's favorite
Air Mail

Hello from a very small kitchen in Leeds! A jar of your Hellfire & Brimstone has made me a legend at the Thursday pub quiz. Please, whatever you do, never change the label.

Owen T.Leeds, England
The Sunday Supper Club

Wish you were here!

Once a month we'll mail you a letter from the kitchen: new batches, a family recipe or two, and first dibs on the Christmas-only Pecan Smoke before it sells out.

No junk mail. Grandma Ruby wouldn't stand for it.

— Love, the Castillos

Address this card to:

One letter a month. Unsubscribe any time — no hard feelings.