That list of ingredients is awful.
“Red jalapeno, sugar, water, salt acetic acid, garlic, natural flavor, xanthan gum, sodium metabisulfite, and/or sodium bisulfite (sulfiting agent / preservative), potassium sorbate (preservative).”
I’ve had sriracha in the past and it’s disgustingly sweet. Apparently it’s 17% sugar!
How much sauce are you putting on your food though? 17% sugar is bad in a drink where it adds up fast, but for a hot sauce where you're using maybe 2 teaspoons max (likely less), that's like 1-2 grams of sugar. Essentially a rounding error in your daily intake.
Sure, you can skip sugar entirely if you want to. But then you're getting a different flavor entirely. Southeast Asian stuff is often sweet and spicy and gets that flavor through sugar. No way around it, unless you're using artificial sweeteners.
nothing about this ingredients list is awful, what are you talking about?
But it has chemicals in it...