Basically. Bunch of peppers, put them in a clean jar, fill with water with 6 procent of salt, so 1 liter water + 60 grams of salt. You can vary from 3 to 10 procent. Make sure the peppers are under the brine, so they don't come in contact with air. Turn lid every day to let CO2 escape and close again, don't take the lid off the jar. After a week you already have a nice fermented hot sauce if the jar is in a warm place, but you can ferment way longer. I like 2 to 3 weeks. Blender or a stick blender the peppers with some of the brine. You can use the left over brine to marinate meat, make other sauces or gravies, salad dressing and so on.
I like to add onions, lots of garlic and herbs like thai basil too in the fermenting process.
Fish sauce! Most common use is to mix with sugar, garlic, chili, and lime as a dipping sauce. It sort of goes in everything though,
Mam tom is awesome too. It's made by fermenting small shrimp. The sauce comes out purple with a bunch of black dots (shrimp eyes). It sounds and smells terrible, but tastes great. Typically we mix it with lime, sugar, chili, and a little pork fat. Often this makes it start fizzing and bubbling. Then it's a dipping sauce for tofu, vegetables, and deep fried stuff. It's really great.
If you keep having to add lime, chili, garlic and sugar to all your gross nonsense, maybe you really just like lime, sugar, garlic and chili, no need for the gross nonsense.
Or maybe it's fantastic, and even better with those things. I mean, look at the ingredient list on Western condiments. I think you'll see more than 5 ingredients...
When I was working in the Barnsley area I used to pick it up to bring it home to the south. The last time I was there I made sure to stock up on it, now you can just get it anywhere - they sell it in my local Sainsbury's and Waitrose now.