Chilli Vodka

Chilli Vodka is a very simple thing to make, it seems to have gone out of fashion at the moment. You can us any chillies you fancy, deep red chillies with give the Vodka a nice colour if left long enough.

I was given a couple of bottles of Inferno Vodka 5 years ago, we drank one and save the other, as you can see the colour from the  hydroponically grown 911 chillies has tinted the Vodka.

Let six chillies (maybe Jalapenos) ripen to red, then harvest. Cut off the Peduncle (the stem) and Calyx (the green bit that holds the stem to the flesh), then cut in half length-ways and remove the seeds and Placenta (The white bit between the seeds and the flesh). If they were large peppers cut again into quarters, they need to fit into the bottle.

Now comes the hard part, open a bottle of good quality Vodka and remove a glass full (don’t drink it yet), push the slices of jalapeno into the bottle and then top the bottle backup from the vodka you did not drink earlier, seal up the bottle. Now if there is any leftover you can now drink this.

You will need to keep this for at least 8 weeks for the vodka to take the flavour from the chillies, it is a great drink to make at the end of the chilli season ready for a winter warming.

Alternatively, some people don't de-seed the chillies and just leave them whole but prick them all with a fine pin

Pickled Whole Chillies

Recipe of the Week – Pickled Chilli Peppers

Shows off the full splendour of the chillies

I love my chillies and am always looking for ways to preserve them; here is another!Chilli peppers will freeze and dry quite well, but pickling is an approach that retains their colour and flavour excellently. The vinegar in the pickle is also believed to reduce the heat in them.
This excellent recipe is from Mark Diacono’s A Year at Otter Farm and takes just afew minutes to make. This recipe made three jam-jars of pickle, with the chilliesstanding upright in the jars.

Ingredients:

• 250g chilli peppers

• 500ml white wine vinegar

• a pinch of salt

• 100g caster sugar

• 3 bay leaves

• 12 peppercorns

Directions

Dissolve the sugar and salt in the vinegar in a pan over a medium heat. Add the bay leaf and the peppercorns and simmer for 10 minutes. Be careful that it doesn’t boil off.

Remove from the heat.

Pierce each chilli 5 or 6 times.

Put the chilli-peppers into sterilised jars and pour the hot vinegar over them to cover – then seal. Check liquid levels in jars after about a week.

Store in a cool, dark cupboard for up to a year. Keep in the fridge once opened.