Homemade Hot Chilli Sauce

It seems that last week's post well and truly goosed my laptop / blogger or whatever it was.  For the moment though, it seems to be playing nicely so I'll test the waters with this blog steal I made recently, at Hubby's request.  He is a fiend for hot food and asked me to try and find a recipe for a hot sauce similar in taste and spiciness as the one that is severed at his favorite chain restaurant.  He seems pretty happy with this first attempt ... good thing too, as I now have about 15 baby chilli plants growing in pots around the flat, and judging by their recent growth spurt I'll soon have a merry assortment of mild to super-duper-blow-your-head-off-hot chillies.

Homemade Hot Chilli Sauce
150g chillies of your choice (I recommend starting with the mild ones and working your way up)
5 garlic cloves, crushed
2 shallots, finely chopped
1 tbsp veg oil
400g tinned tomatoes or passata
1 tbsp soy sauce
3 tbsp rice vinegar
3 tbsp caster sugar

Remove stems of chillies, rinse clean. Blot dry with paper towel. Wearing rubber gloves, mince the chili peppers. The smaller the cut, the smoother your final sauce will be.

In a saucepan, heat the oil and then add the garlic and shallots. Saute over medium to high heat for a about 1 minute or until light brown and fragrant.

Add the tinned tomatoes or passata and the chillies. Let the sauce come to a simmer then lower the heat to keep it at a low simmer. Add the soy sauce, vinegar, and sugar. Mix well.

Continue simmering the sauce for about 5 minutes. This will break down the chillies and soften them to create the smooth consistency.

Remove from heat and allow to cool completely (I left the sauce overnight at this stage).

Transfer the sauce to a blender and blend until smooth or until most of the chilli skin and seeds break down- preferably on the 'liquefy' mode.

Get Hubby to taste the hot sauce!  If you need to you can add more of whatever is required, add more sugar, vinegar or water. Blend one last time till smooth. Pour into clean, air tight jar and refrigerate.

The original recipe says to use within about 1 week but ours has been on the go for about 2 weeks now and is still perfectly fine, if anything it seems to be 'improving' with age!  We keep it in an airtight jar in the fridge though.

Stolen from the White On Rice Couple

We've head this as a marinade for Chicken Goujons (or as the chain restaurant calls them 'boneless chicken wings'!) for dinner through the week with salad and Hubby will be using even more on his barbie tonight.  Well worth a try!

Hopefully normal service has now been resumed blogging wise, during the wee glitch I have tried to leave comments on as many of your posts as possible, sometimes though technology got the better of me!  Going to attempt and add an update to the We Should Cocoa round up as a couple of you have requested, fingers crossed ...