Well first, let me tell you what I did....

I took dried datils and course sea salt and ground it in coffee grinder.

This produces a VERY fine powder....which sucks because it is prone to clumping....but you seem to need a little something besides the pepper to help abrade and suspend the pepper during grinding.

Then I put in some citric acid to sour it up (think of powdered hot sauce).

It tasted pretty good, but it turned solid in a few days. I added some rice and broke it up so it is "ok" now.

It is really tasty on.....wait for it..........salad.

Next time, I will dry the **** out if the peppers....Maybe even using a dessicant. Then I will use less course salt to grind, and then mix this in with ordinary salt and citric acid powder.

That makes sense, the silicon dioxide (or other anti-caking ingredient) in the regular salt should take care of things well enough.

As for the grind, did you use a burr grinder or the more common/cheap spinning blade grinder?

I seem to recall someone telling a story about trying to grind dried habeneros in a standard grinder once, maybe it was even you that told the story, I don't honestly remember. Anyway, punchline went something like "it was like someone tossed a tear gas grendade into the kitchen".

cheap grinder......I didn't want to wreck my burr grinder.

it may have been me that told that story.

I wonder if there isn't such a thing as 'pharmaceutical grade' vinegar?

^

There is an "industial grade". I believe it's called "canning vinegar" or "pickling vinegar", problem is, I don't think you can buy it in quantities less than a semi-truck tanker trailer load. It's what the pickle manufacturers use, it's rather strong, like 20% or 30% acidity IIRC, and they just dilute it at the factory. Cuts the raw material transport costs down considerably.

I've heard that Heinz used to sell a 10% white vinegar years ago in one gallon jugs at some markets for pickling use, but I've never seen it personally.

If it were me ... I would just use the bottled vinegar's (malt, distilled, wine, cider, spiced etc); draught vinegar's are not strong enough.

White distilled or cider vinegar's of 5 percent acidity (50 grain) are recommended.

Use cold vinegar for crisp vegetables and boiling vinegar for softer ones. The vinegar should cover the peppers by at least an inch (2.5cm). For a home-made spiced vinegar, boil 1oz (25g) of mixed pickling spice in 1 pint (600ml) of vinegar for 5 minutes. Strain when cold.

As far a overkill on the sauces go in Charlie's comment ... I use to go through one small bottle (what I sent to Andy) of the 'chili garlic' paste a week ... so what I sent him would last me about 6 months.

^Slim....the high acid vinegar has an appeal to me because it can impart a flavor and preservative effect without having to use a lot of it (a lot of water).

I also remember people using 10% vinegar for pickling and I liked the results better.....pickled eggs for example.