Sweet chilli sauce: twenty minutes instead of a bottle from the shop
Many bottled sweet chilli sauces are mostly glucose-fructose syrup and colouring. The homemade version takes twenty minutes and a handful of ingredients, and differs above all in that you can taste real chilli in it, not just sweetness. That characteristic clinging, translucent texture comes from potato starch added at the end — not from long boiling, which would turn the sauce into a sticky syrup.
Your own work in that: 30 min.
- Chopping 10 min
- Boiling 12 min
- Jars 8 min
Step by step
0 / 5 doneChop the chilli and garlic
Chop the chillies very finely, seeds included — they carry the heat and give the red flecks suspended in the finished sauce. Chop the garlic just as fine. For a milder sauce, deseed half the chillies.
Ingredients: 6 pcs red chillies · 5 cloves garlic · 250 g sugar · 120 ml rice vinegar · 200 ml water · 1 tsp salt
TipAfter chopping chilli, wash the board and your hands with <b>soap, not water alone</b>. Capsaicin does not dissolve in water and stays on your fingers for hours.
Very finely, seeds includedBoil with sugar and vinegar
Put everything except the starch in a saucepan, bring to the boil and cook over medium heat 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. The sugar dissolves and the liquid turns glossy and faintly syrupy. The kitchen will smell sharp, so turn the extractor on.
Ingredients: 6 pcs red chillies · 5 cloves garlic · 250 g sugar · 120 ml rice vinegar · 200 ml water · 1 tsp salt
TipDon't boil it any longer. The more water evaporates, the thicker the syrup gets, and once cool the sauce turns into a sticky, stringy mass instead of pouring off a spoon.
Ten minutes; the liquid turns glossyThicken with starch
Slake the starch smooth in cold water and pour it into the bubbling sauce in a thin stream, stirring constantly. Cook another 60 seconds. The sauce thickens at once and turns translucent, with the chilli flecks suspended evenly throughout.
Ingredients: 2 tsp potato starch · 3 tbsp cold water
TipStarch tipped in dry seizes into lumps. There is no way round slaking it in cold water first.
Starch in cold water, then a thin streamCheck the consistency
The sauce is ready when it coats a spoon and runs off it slowly. Remember it thickens noticeably as it cools — if it looks perfect in the pan it will be too thick in the jar. Loosen with a spoon of water if needed.
Pour into jars
Pour the hot sauce into scalded jars, seal and cool. Keep in the fridge for up to a month. Don't store it in the pantry: garlic and chilli are low-acid, the acidity of a homemade sauce can't be reliably checked, and under-acidified preserves can harbour botulism.
Hot, into scalded jars
Before you start
What to serve it with
Spring rolls, fried chicken, prawns, chips, and as a marinade base. Stirred into mayonnaise or yogurt it makes a dip in a minute that vanishes fastest from any table.
Controlling the heat
Six chillies give a medium-hot sauce. For milder, remove all the seeds and membranes. For hotter, add a teaspoon of chilli flakes along with the sugar.
Without starch
You can boil it longer until it thickens on its own, but then the sugar caramelises and the sauce darkens, losing its red colour and the freshness of the chilli. Starch is the better answer here.
Which vinegar
Rice vinegar is mild and closest to the original. Cider vinegar works well; spirit vinegar is too harsh and overwhelms the chilli. Balsamic turns the sauce brown.