What is Louisiana’s most famous culinary contribution? Hot sauce, of course!

Which hot sauce is Louisiana’s favorite? Tabasco! Wrong.

In fact, that’s wrong twice over. Capitol Hill’s Uncle Brutha recently went up against the international hot-sauce manufacturer right on its own patch and beat it at its own game. A fired-up Uncle Brutha – a.k.a. Brennan Proctor – finds it tough to hide his glee when he relates how he entered the Cajun Hot Sauce Festival and came home to Eastern Market a winner in two of the major categories.

Staged in New Iberia, just nine miles from Tabasco’s Avery Island plant, he pitched his heat-laden sauces against 28 other competitors from across the US, including Tabasco. His Number 10 won the best red sauce, his Number 9 the best green sauce. The judges were the finest you can find for a cook-off contest: customers. And around 20,000 of them made the rounds of the sauces, all with hidden labels, before voting in the “People’s Choice” awards.

The rosettes and diplomas for this latest win will take pride of place on Proctor’s growing wall of awards at his Hot Sauce Emporium on Seventh Street SE. Since starting his career as a hot sauce maker four years ago, first with a stall in Eastern Market, then his shop, Proctor has taken the fiery world by storm, notching up 20-plus wins at prestigious national contests.

But these latest victories in the heart of Cajun country are special. “I’m getting a real kick out of having won in Louisiana, the home of hot sauce,” he says. “And to beat Tabasco, now that’s sweet.”

As a child in Southeast Washington and later as a teen in Prince George’s County, Proctor was fond of reading cookbooks and experimenting in the kitchen. A potluck party in the late 1980s saw him producing a pile of Buffalo chicken wings that the other party-goers raved about.

In 1991 he moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in music video production. He did well, being sought after by top names as a sound engineer. He counted Janet Jackson, Britney Spears, Snoop Dog and Alanis Morissette among the stars he worked with. One Christmas, the company he worked for wanted to break the mold when it came to giving gifts. Hot sauce was mentioned, Proctor said he’d make it – and the beginning of his new life was launched.

Soon the Hollywood movers and shakers of the music industry were making it a condition of Proctor working on their albums that he brought his hot sauce to recording sessions. “Then they started asking to buy it,” he recalls. “So when the music business started to change, and I was thinking about moving on, I thought, maybe I really did have something with my hot sauce that I could get into the marketplace.”

He decided to base his business back home, here in DC, where he knew he could count on a lot of family support to get him going and keep him going. And the Hot Sauce Emporium, just about to celebrate its second anniversary, has certainly turned into a family affair. Depending on the day of the week, customers are greeted by any combination of Proctor’s family: his mother Colette, sister Brigette, cousin Roxanne and nephew Ryan.

And it’s thanks to his sister and her son that the business is called Uncle Brutha’s. All her life, Brigette has called her brother, “Brutha.” So when Ryan was born, Proctor quipped: “So I guess I’m Uncle Brutha now.” The nickname stuck – in more ways than one, with thousands of bottles of hot sauce produced each month and labeled “Uncle Brutha’s.”

The Number 10 sauce was named because that’s the number of years Proctor “fooled around” to find what he considers a 10 out of 10 heat-power challenge. It has a slow building heat. The name Number 9 just followed naturally. Its heat is not as intense as the 10 and is felt instantly. The long-experimented-with recipes guarantee that neither of them packs misery-making heat.

“I’m always telling people not to be scared about trying my sauces,” he says. “I assure them the heat does not overpower the flavor and is not going to linger.” Which is why the pay-off line on the new t-shirts he’s selling says: “Trust Uncle Brutha.”

His shop, stuffed with 1,500 other hot-pepper, chili-laden products, is hot sauce heaven. But it’s Proctor’s sauces that are best-sellers. And not just here. Uncle Brutha’s is available in many retailers in the region, including Whole Foods Market Stores. And Proctor expects to ink a deal shortly that will see him supplying the baseball VIP catering suites at Nationals’ Park.

Meanwhile he’s counting on the Louisiana awards setting fire to his shop business. Particularly, as a real fire indirectly damaged it. In the year since Eastern Market burned, he’s seen, like most traders on Seventh Street, a downturn in business. “If we were getting the pre-fire traffic, everything would be fine,” he says. “I’m trying not to be fearful about the future. I’m trying to stay optimistic. Hopefully my wins at the Cajun Hot Sauce Festival will bring the shop a much-needed boost.”

So help Proctor celebrate his cool win – hot foot it to Uncle Brutha’s.