Overview The NYC Hot Sauce Expo is a two-day weekend of sauce tasting at Industry City in Sunset Park, Brooklyn, where makers pour free samples at their own tables and the Stage of DOOM runs eating challenges called Doughnuts of Death, the Slaytanic Burrito and Bobbing for Reaper Peppers. The April 2026 edition was the 13th, with 43 sauce makers on the vendor list, from Brooklyn and Queens out to Florida, Illinois, Tennessee and Vermont, plus craft beer, cocktails and food vendors. The organizers list sister expos in Portland, Oregon, Joliet, Illinois, and Nashville. On site Doors open at 10 a.m. and the floor closes at 6 p.m. both days, rain or shine. The stage runs an event roughly every hour: in 2026 Saturday opened with the Screaming Mi Mi Awards and went on to the Burning BBQ Pork Challenge and the Spicy Pizza of DOOM, and Sunday brought the Spicy Tacos of Hell, the Chicken Wings of Death and a reaper-pepper cocktail demo. Challengers are members of the public who sign up in advance, and spaces are limited. The makers sell bottles on the spot, so people taste and buy as they go. A backstage-pass VIP area, capped at 200 guests in 2026, has an open bar, spirit tastings and a BBQ platter. Industry City's courtyards face the harbor, the Statue of Liberty and lower Manhattan, and the D, N and R stop at 36th Street, a few minutes' walk away. Audience The organizers describe the crowd as Gen Z and millennial young professionals and foodies. Children 10 and under get in free with an adult, and anyone ordering at the bar must be 21. General admission covers the tastings and the stage, and food and drink are paid for separately. Brand presence In 2026 every challenge and demo on the Stage of DOOM ran under a presenting brand's name, from Sixpoint's Spicy Pizza of DOOM and Threes Brewing's Spicy Tacos of Hell to an Absolut Tabasco cocktail demo. High River Sauces put a bottle of its sauce into every Craft Beer Package, which was limited to 250 a day, and VIP guests leave with a gift bag filled with sponsor product.