Page 38 - the NOISE September 2014

BUSINESSNEWS
RISING HY:
HEALTHY LIVING WITH A KICK
from left: The varieties of Rising Hy sauces & President of Rising Hy and the Tortilla Lady, Mike Konefal in the Fourth Street kitchen.
STORY AND PHOTOS BY CLAIR ANNA ROSE
you eat spicy food, your brain releases pain receptors and naturally you get a high because you are releasing endor- phins,” he says. “It’s actually an addiction. That’s why people, after tasting spicy foods, go back for more and more of it. I’d love to see Rising Hy on the bottom of a pair of skis or a snow board, 30 feet out of the park, because I think Rising Hy makes a lot more sense than energy drinks, which you shouldn’t be feeding 12-year olds. Because of the release of endorphins you get a rush, so instead of sugary drinks, you can take 2 shakes of hot sauce. Hot sauce has been known to boost insulin in diabetes patients and boost metabolism. We’re trying to incorporate our non-GMO, all-natural sauces into people’s lives to help them make healthier decisions.”
Before I leave, Mr. Konfal and Ms. Gra- ham make sure I have a bag full of all the Rising Hy products. We open a bottle of GreenGo Sauce and Mr. Konefal shows mehowtodoashotofhotsauce:he holds the bottle up in the air above his head and pours the sauce directly into his mouth. My hot sauce shot-taking skills could use a little refinement, but the team over at Rising Hy has the tech- nique mastered. It’s been fun incor- porating the Habanero Hot into foods when spice is needed, but I must say my personal favorites are the GreenGo and Honey Mustard.
Rising Hy & Tortilla Lady, 2114 N 4th Street, carry the full line of Rising Hy sauces: Habañero Hot Suace, Honey Mustard, Habañero Olive Oil, Devil Dust Habañero Salt, and GreenGo sauce. All their products can be ordered online and have the option of being drop shipped to anywhere in the USA. Businesses and restaurants that are interested in carry- ing Rising Hy or incorporating them into their menu can contact Mr. Konefal di- rectly. 928/774-3810, Risinghy.com
| Clair Anna Rose passes the spicy mustard, if asked politely. clairannarose@gmail.com
On a Thursday morning I visit the Rising Hy & Tortilla Lady store- front on Fourth Street in Flagstaff. When I walk in they are making cinna- mon chips out of the tortillas they press in their kitchen. Their store front hosts their full line of hot sauces, freshly made tortillas and a fridge of homemade ta- males. Vice President Dawn Graham shows me around the kitchen — point- ing out the new tortilla press they just got, the big stoves for brewing sauce, and today’s spread of trays for coating flour tortillas in a cinnamon and sugar mix to make their very own dessert.
I chat with Rising Hy President Mike Konefal, who tells me how his busi- ness got started. “During my sopho- more year of college here at NAU, my best friend growing up thought it was funny that I was trying to brew beer
— it exploded all over my room!” he re- calls. “Two months later for Christmas he got me a make-your-own hot sauce kit which was three empty bottles and recipe packets. I started mixing and matching and experimenting. Essen- tially I came out with the Habanero Hot sauce. I used to keep it in a whis- key bottle on the fridge. Friends and neighbors would come over and have rice and beans which we would drown in hot sauce. Senior year, I decided as I was graduating that I was going to try to start a business.”
He ducks into the office to retrieve a framed photograph of his friend, who gave him the hot sauce kit and himself at a music festival. “This picture was taken at 4AM. His mug shot is now the label for Rising Hy and he has his face on bottles at 180 Sprouts stores across the nation.”
Mr. Konefal loves to cook, and feels the Rising Hy line can be used in any kitchen. “We have a range of sauces because they are designed to be used before, during and after cooking. You can cook with them, you can add them at the end or you can marinate with them. It’s to help people make food healthier, more easily, more flavorful
and of course, add a little kick to it.”
“I’ve always loved food,” Mr. Konefal con-
tinues. “I’m the last of a combined family of eight. In our house, when it came to cook- ing you either cooked or you cleaned dishes. I loved to cook and started to cook when I was ten because I hated doing dishes. I just started experimenting and I loved spice. I was tired of buying hot sauce that, when I put it on my food, only tasted like the hot sauce. The vinegar base of most hot sauces is super acidic and overpowers food. When I started playing around with it I thought I wanted to make a sauce I could put on food that enhances the flavor and goes along with the food, whatever that may be.
“My brother is a chef so I give him credit because he and I invent all of the sauces to- gether,” Mr. Konefal says. “As the years went on, it was more fun because I got to spend time with my bro. He and I were the cooks in the house when we were younger. It’s been fun to twist and try and reinvent.”
What sets Rising Hy hot sauces apart from most brands is the lack of vinegar. Mr. Kone- fal tells me why he chooses to leave this in- gredient out. “It’s over powering to food and it masks the flavor. I don’t want to spend a half hour cooking a nice meal and then pour vinegar all over it. It just tastes like vinegar. I want to taste my burrito, and then I want some spice to follow. The habanero pepper that we use in all of our sauces is a delayed heat, so it comes on naturally after you eat it. Ninety-nine percent of the hot sauces on the market are vinegar based. If you look at the sodium content on hot sauces across the board, a lot of them, to balance out the acid- ity, put in large amounts of salt. Our Habane- ro Hot is low sodium because we don’t need to compete with any flavors.”
As the business became a success, Rising Hy required a bigger kitchen where they could produce enough sauce to meet de- mands — and to try out new recipes they didn’t have space to make before. “Three years ago the Tortilla Lady was going out of business,” Mr. Konefal says. “It had been around for about 12 years and I didn’t want to see it die, so we decided to buy it, save it and merge it with Rising Hy. We needed a
commercial kitchen to mass produce our sauces. At that time we were using Cuvee 928’s kitchen and we couldn’t mass produce them. We’re at 180 Sprouts now, and a lot of locations around town.”
Peace Surplus, Homeco, Coppa Café, Al- titudes, Diablo Burger and Mama Burger are a few places you can find Rising Hy, either as an item for sale, or as a condiment on the table. Rising Hy and Tortilla Lady tortillas are also available at grocery stores around town.
“We’re really trying to get the sauces every- where. We pretty much have an application for any restaurant and any food item. With the new tortilla press, we can now do a 12- to
14-inch tortilla size, and corn tortillas as well. We’re really trying to shift the local market back to local products. Instead of ordering through Shamrock for tortillas and hot sauce, we can deliver it from 4th Street to any loca- tion in Flagstaff.”
Rising Hy will now be able to offer a truly gluten-free corn tortilla, with separate press- es for corn and flour tortillas. Plus, every Rising Hy hot sous-chef makes a conscious effort to keep the kitchen gluten-free when brewing sauces, cleaning the whole kitchen thoroughly before bringing in ingredients for sauces. And the company’s sauces and tortillas are made on different days to pre- vent cross-contamination.
In addition to filling each bottle by hand — as many as 1,000 per day now — Rising Hy also labels each individual bottle themselves.
“We even do private labeling now,” Mr. Kone- fal says. “If you’re getting married and you want to give everyone a bottle of hot sauce we can actually print custom labels and put it on our sauce. We can also do that for other special events and corporate gatherings.”
Beyond being a hot sauce, Mr. Konefal likes to refer to Rising Hy as a lifestyle brand. “Ris- ing Hy means, ‘If you’re going to do some- thing — rise high above the competition!’ We’re trying to promote healthy eating and are actually going after the extreme sports market. We sponsored some motocross riders, young and up and coming kids, and teamed up with KC Hilites.”
There are health benefits to eating haba- ñero, which Mr. Konefal explains. “When
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