Delicious Slow Chili Peppers

Great thing with canning something is that it actually doesn’t take that long to do it. This week I wanted to try pickled and caramelized chili peppers, and it took less than 30 minutes to get two jars of sweet hotness to the fridge.

The Internet is full of great recipes for pickled chillies, but this one is so simple it can be easily memorized and you don’t need to keep your phone open while cooking. To memorize, just remember the amount of water: amount of sugar is half of water, and amount of vinegar is half of sugar. Memorizing recipes is a great way to avoid getting ingredients on your phone – did I mention that my phone now smells like Russian Dill Pickles?

Pickled Chili Peppers

Ingredients:

• 10 chili peppers – types depending on how hot you like. I used jalapenos and Spanish medium-hot red chili peppers
• 1/4 dl vinegar
• 1/2 dl sugar – or equal amount of sweetener. I used stevia powder.
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 dl water

These amounts are good for a small jar of pickled chillies. Depending on the size of your jar, you might need to adjust a bit. I had a bit more chili peppers and not a very small jar so I doubled the ingredients.

Instructions:

1. Prepare the jar(s). Clean them well and then either use sanitiser or put the jars in cattle with boiling water for a while. I used sanitiser liquid meant for sanitizing beer bottles before bottling.
2. Cut the chili peppers into slices. Some like it very thin, I like mine a bit thicker but it doesn’t really matter how thick the slices are. If you’re using very hot chili peppers, it is recommended to wear disposable food prep gloves.
3. Remove the seeds and the white pith from the chili pepper slices. Don’t remove all though, especially if you like hot chilis. The hotness of the chili peppers is mostly contained in the seeds and the pith. My chili peppers were not very hot so I didn’t remove any of the seeds or pith. It’s a lot faster to cut the slices then as well.
4. Add all ingredients, except the chili slices in a kettle and bring to boil. Stir and let it boil for a few minutes, and make sure all sugar dissolves in the stock.
5. Put the chili pepper slices in a jar and pour the hot solution on top of them so that all slices are submerged. Close the lid, let the jar cool down and place it in the fridge for at least 24 hours. Pickled chili peppers just get better over time.

You can use the pickled chili peppers in pretty much anything. They go on the side with almost any food, on top of sandwiches, inside burgers – or just eat them straight out of the jar.

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Caramelized Chili Peppers

I wanted to also try a bit more sweeter chili peppers. These take a little longer to be ready, about two weeks in the fridge.

Ingredients:

• 10 chili peppers
• 3 1/2 dl sugar or equal amount of sweetener. I used stevia powder again.
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 1/4 dl apple cider vinegar
• 1/4 dl water
• 1/4 tsp. ground turmeric
• 1 1/2 tsp. garlic powder

Instructions:

1. Prepare the jars and slice the chilis in thin slices. Leave the seeds and the white pith if you like them hot. Refer to the pickled chili peppers recipe above for details.
2. Put all the ingredients except chili slices in a kettle and bring to boil. Let it boil and stir until all sugar has dissolved.
3. Put the chili slices in the jar and pour the syrup on top. Make sure all chilis are submerged and close the lid.
4. Let the jar cool down and place it in the fridge for at least two weeks.

I give no guarantee for if these are good for anything since mine aren’t ready yet! I’ll edit this post once I’ve tasted those so you might be able to avoid having to eat a jar of horrible chili peppers 😂 Seriously speaking, I don’t see how these could be bad. With sugar, vinegar and chili peppers one really can’t go wrong!