Sweet chili sauce
A versatile sauce for dipping, salad dressing or addition to stir fries for a sticky and glossy finish. Sweet chili sauce is available in Asian stores, but most are thickened with starch. In this recipe, starch is omitted. Instead, the ingredients are boiled until reduced to a syrupy consistency.
Servings 1 cup
Ingredients
- 7 bird's eye chilies
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 thumb-sized knob ginger
- 1 cup white sugar
- 2 generous pinches salt
- 1 tablespoon rice vinegar or lemon juice
- ½ teaspoon lemon zest
Instructions
- Peel the garlic and the ginger. Cut of the tops of the chilies and discard. Chop the ginger, garlic and chilies.
- Place the sugar in a thick-bottomed pot. Add the chopped garlic, chilies and ginger, and the salt.
- Pour in the rice wine vinegar or lemon juice and add the lemon zest.
- Pour in a cup of water. Stir to dissolve the sugar and salt.
- Set over medium heat, bring to the boil then lower the heat to medium-low and cook, uncovered, for 10 to 12 minutes.
- The sweet chili sauce will appear watery after 10 to 12 minutes of cooking. DO NOT be tempted to cook it much longer. The sauce will turn syrupy as it cools. If you cook it until it is thick, by the time it cools, it will harden and no longer be pourable at all.
- Cool the sweet chili sauce and enjoy.
- To store, pour the sauce into a jar (you can transfer it into a bottle but you will need to use a funnel). Cover and keep in the fridge.