Hot Sauce As Coin Cleaning Agent?

olive oil may clean it up without causing damage to the coin

Olive oil is SLIGHTLY acidic, nowhere close to what Vinegar is. (and acetic acid is considered a weak acid)

If it's a circulated coin and not mint state... if it's not a rare date that you are aware of where improper cleaning could cost you money...
If it's filthy and circulated running it under water and rubbing it with your fingers isn't going to hurt it any more than it sitting in someone's wet pocket all of a rainy day.

I'd avoid chemicals or soaps, detergents, acids, salts, all that jazz... but on a filthy dirty coin I've even gone as far as a soft toothbrush and running hot water because hey its no worse in my opinion that a year or more in circulation was.

Mint state, uncirculated, proof coins are a different story. I don't think you should do anything to them unless you're looking to devalue them, or like silver, if you want them to be bullion only.

Dirty circulated coins... yeah I don't think it's a big deal to clean with some water and some light rubbing. I think distilled water would be better than tap water though, it won't have chemicals in it like chlorine or flouride.

Anyways. My 2 cents. If it's circulated, it's not going to be much worse than circulated. It than he chemicals and acids/corrosives that really discolor or destroy coins from people's cleaning attempts.

Like someone using a rag and a can of brasso. Lol

Numismatics are nut cases lol. 99.9% of the people asking about cleaning coins have metal detected coins. I can barley distinguish the value by judging it's size. But don't clean it tho oooohhhh lol

See my response:

http://goccf.com/t/343807#2943211

Agree. In my experience, the urge to clean coins is driven by the desire to have shiny coins--and the vast majority of those coins are circulated examples, not detector finds.