This easy Homemade Sweet Chilli Sauce is a fantastic way to use up a bunch of homegrown chillies. Growing Chillies is a great place to start for Beginner Gardeners or those with limited space, as they are easy to grow and can produce an abundance of chilli on one plant. Chilli plants like warm weather, but they can be grown throughout winter in a greenhouse or warm spot. I will cut back my chilli plants soon, place them in a warm area and let them go semi-dormant for the winter, which is called “overwintering”. That way come spring and summer, the plants are well established and will provide me with a decent crop.
This recipe can be adjusted to be as mild or hot as you like. You can use different chilli varieties, but obviously, the hotter the variety, the more your sweet chilli sauce will pack a punch! If you are concerned, I would remove and save the seeds from 3/4 of the chilli, and once it has cooked down a bit, taste and add more of the seeds to get the desired heat. I just went all-in with the seeds and used a hot Thai Chilli variety, so mine turned out quite hot, but I like that.
Easy Homemade Sweet Chilli Sauce
Yield: 500g
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 1 hour
Additional Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 1 hour15 minutes
This easy Homemade Sweet Chilli Sauce is a fantastic way to use up a bunch of homegrown chillies. Growing Chillies is a great place to start for Beginner Gardeners or those with limited space as they are easy to grow and can produce an abundance of chilli on one plant.
This recipe can be adjusted to be as mild or hot as you like. You can use different chilli varieties but obviously, the hotter the variety the more your sweet chilli sauce will pack a punch! If you are concerned I would remove and save the seeds from 3/4 of the chilli and once it has cooked down a bit, taste and add more of the seeds to get the desired heat. I just went all-in with the seeds and used a hot Thai Chilli variety so mine turned out quite hot but I like that.
Ingredients
250 - 350g Chilli
8 Cloves Garlic
5 cm piece of Ginger
2 cups Sugar
2 cups White Vinegar
3 teaspoons Salt
Instructions
Wash chilli and cut off the green stems.
Roughly chop the Chilli, Garlic and Ginger and add to a mixing bowl or food processer.
Blitz the mixture into a rough paste using either a food processor or stick mixer. If using a stick mixer make sure you cover the bowl with a cloth to stop bits of chilli flying everywhere!
Add the blitzed chilli mixture to a pot and add Sugar, Vinegar and Salt.
Bring to the boil and then let it simmer on a low - medium heat until the mixture thickens (45min - 1hr).
The mixture will continue to thicken as it cools. Add a dash of water or extra vinegar if need be.
Heat oven to 130 degrees celsius and add your clean jars or bottles to sterilize for 15mins. Put the lids in a bowl of boiling water for 5 minutes.
Carefully pour the warm sauce mixture into your jars while they are still warm and secure the lids on.
Store in the fridge and use within 3-4 weeks*
* For long term storage place in smaller containers or jars and freeze or use canning methods for long term preservation.
Notes
If you want a mild sweet chilli sauce, remove 3/4 of the chilli seeds and set aside. Once the mixture has started to reduce, taste and add extra seeds as desired.
Serve with Sweet Potato Fries, as a Stirfry sauce, burger sauce or even add to noodles and vegetables for a deliciously tasty meal packed full of flavour.
If you have chilli plants that ripen at different times or a smaller amount to harvest, try freezing them whole until you have enough saved up to make the recipe. Other ways to preserve your chillies are to dry them out and keep them whole or try blitzing the dried chillies to make a chilli powder or flakes.
I hope you enjoy this easy homemade sweet chilli sauce!
Watch My Chilli Harvest and How to Make Sweet Chilli Sauce
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What to do with lemons?! Lemon and citrus season is in full swing and if you are lucky enough, you may be struggling to use up all your produce before it goes to waste. A great problem to have! Below are a few of my favourite ways to use up lemons. I love how the lemon season coincides with the flu season and lemons are a fantastic natural remedy, packed full of vitamin C for colds and flu! Nature really is amazing. If you have a ton of lemons, below are some great ways to preserve your lemons so you can use them throughout the year.
Fresh off the Tree
One of the best ways to extend your harvest is to leave them on the tree for as long as you can. As soon as you pick them they will start to ripen and deteriorate much quicker than if they remain on the tree. I love fresh lemons especially walking out to my garden and picking a lemon and cutting it up for a fresh cup of hot lemon water or in summer, iced lemon water! This is also the best way to get the most vitamin C as once you cook or dehydrate lemons, the Vitamin C levels reduce significantly. But there is only so much fresh lemon I can eat…
Gifting or Swapping
Gifting or trading your excess lemons is a great way to make friends with your neighbours! Your friends, family and work colleagues may also love some fresh lemons if they don’t have a tree at home. This can open up some great conversations and people may even start bringing and gifting their own excess produce.
Dehydrated Lemons
It’s winter and I love a hot water lemon drink in the morning to warm up! The only thing is that often I put the remaining half a lemon in the fridge and it will end up at the back of the fridge until it gets thrown out 🙁 So if I want lemon for my tea I pick a small one and put it somewhere front and centre so I can see it! This is why I love using dehydrated lemons because you can use a couple of slices as needed. Dehydrated lemons can also be used in baking, cake decorating, or finely chopped to add some lemony flavour to your cooking. They rehydrate once they get wet so they work quite similarly to fresh lemon but have a more caramelised flavour.
Lemon Zest Sprinkles
Zest the skins and dehydrate. Place in a jar and use in cooking and baking to as some lemony flavour!
Lemon Juice
You can then juice the lemons and freeze into ice cubes. Once the cubes are frozen, place into a container or freezer bag and label. These can be used in cold drinks, cocktails, cooking, baking and added to boiling water for a delicious hot lemon tea at just the right temperature! (can you tell I like lemon tea).
Citrus Cleaner
Ok, so you have now used the zest and the juice of the lemons, what do you do with the remaining flesh?! Place all the lemon scraps in a jar and fill with White Vinegar. Place in a dark spot in your pantry and leave for two weeks. You can then strain the liquid off and add the same amount of distilled water and you have a natural all-purpose cleaner. This is a great way to get the most out of your lemons with as little waste as possible.
You can also simply throw a few slices into your jug/kettle and add a few dashes of white vinegar and water. Simply boil the jug and then let it sit for 30mins. Rinse and clean. This will help remove the limescale and calcium build-ups on your jug.
Baking
Lemon slice, lemon meringue pie, lemon cheesecake. I’m not one for baking recipes but I have been doing some trial and error lately!
Roasted Lemons
In winter I like to make a roast vegetable salad because it’s a little bit more of a winter warmer but not too heavy. I chop up my root vegetables (carrots, sweet potato, beetroot, potato etc) along with some wedges of lemon and oven roast with oil and herbs. This is a great way to use up those half lemons in the fridge or some lemons that are getting too ripe. Once the vegetables are roasted I serve in a bowl of chopped up greens and top with feta cheese, pumpkin seeds, and aioli dressing. The roasted lemon wedges can then be squeezed on top and they add beautiful mellow caramelised lemon flavour.
Lemon Butter
Lemon butter or curd is heaven in a jar! This is a super luxurious and delicious way to use lemons and can also make great gifts! Enjoy on toast, pancakes, meringues or add to the centre of lemon muffins for a delicious surprise.
Other ideas
There are still so many different ways to use lemons that I haven’t tried yet. Here are a few below:
Marmalade
Lemonade!!
Preserved Lemons
Lemon cake
Limoncello
Let me know what you use lemons for in the comments below!
MY GARDENING ESSENTIALS // Fertiliser spray gun: https://bit.ly/366nL1t Retractable Hose: https://bit.ly/2TSC0Bo More gardening tools: https://bit.ly/32IQmbD
DISCLAIMER: Links included in this description might be affiliate links. If you purchase a product or service with the links that I provide I may receive a small commission. There is no additional charge to you! Thank you for supporting my page so I can continue to provide you with free content!
I love growing Chillies! They are so easy to grow and consistently produce in abundance. So learning how to preserve them has been important to me. These homemade Chilli Flakes are a great way to get more out of my Chilli harvests. I am currently growing Jalapeno and Cayenne types. Both plants are in their second season as they are in pots they seem to survive the winters alright. I think this might be their last though.
I usually pick and freeze the chillis then just grab one and use in my cooking but the freezer is looking a bit full so this time I tried dried homemade chilli flakes.
Homemade Chilli Flakes
Place on baking paper in your Dehydrator. If you don’t have a dehydrator you could just set the oven to 60 degrees Celcius.
I then chopped them up as fine as I could and put in a recycled spice jar.
The next crop I want to try pickled Jalapeno. I also have a few different varieties to grow this spring including Carolina Reapers which are apparently one of the hottest in the world….no idea what I will do with those!
How do you preserve your chilli? Let me know in the comments.
