He loves hot sauce so much, he decided to make his own.
Kris Dorris, 43, is opening the Bonita Hot Sauce company in a week, where he will sell nine of his own sauces, along with more than 200 from around the world.
“I’ve always loved hot food,” he said. “When I got here, I found out it was one of the best areas to grow habanero peppers.”
This was in early 1999, when he moved to North Naples from Detroit.
He started his own business, but in graphic design and screen printing. He still does those things, making T-shirts, designing labels for other businesses.
But as his art business grew, he kept thinking about hot sauce.
After moving his graphic design business last year to Bonita Springs, he decided to give hot sauce production a shot.
“Bonita’s an up-and-coming area,” Dorris said.
He runs the business with his wife Kristina, 33, and their daughter Lauren, 18. And he named one of his hot sauces after the youngest of their four children, Drake, who is 1 1Ú2 years old.
The sauce is called Drake Dragon Wing Sauce.
His sauces range from mild to extremely spicy.
The Bonita Sunset sauce is one of the more mild ones.
“It’s similar to Tabasco,” he said.
Then there’s Lee’s Revenge, the hottest one he makes. The label, which he designed, features a picture of Robert E. Lee with grim face, surrendering to the north.
“And we have sauces from Thailand, Jamaica, the Philippines,” he said.
He actually makes 10 sauces, if you count his chicken wing recipe.
Coincidentally, he designs the label for the folks who make one of the most popular chicken wing sauces in the area — the owners of Buffalo Chips.
Chip Greenwood, co-owner of the restaurant that has locations in Bonita and San Carlos Park, said he thinks Dorris’ business will do well.
“People like hot sauce. They like to put it on everything,” he said. “I don’t see why he would not be able to make it. Everyone likes to try different things