Fermented Green Sriracha Chili Pepper Sauce

Homemade Sriracha Chili Sauce 

Know when you go for Vietnamese food and there’s a bright red bottle on the table with a green tip? It’s called Sriracha sauce, aka “rooster sauce”, and it’s made from fermented red chili peppers with vinegar, salt, and sugar. The problem is it’s also often bottled with potassium sorbate, sodium bisulfate and xanthan gum, which act as preservatives and emulsifiers. But a homemade version only takes 4 days (only!) to ferment and lasts a month in the fridge (longer in the freezer). It’s got a richer, deeper flavour, and besides, four days is 361 fewer days than it takes to make Korean red pepper paste, for goodness sake! But if you find yourself saying that’s a lot of chili peppers to blend and a lot of days to wait, you can always buy my homemade green chili pepper sriracha instead. I’ll happily sell it to you for $3.00 for a small jar. I’ve got 6 jars – that’s half a pound of chili peppers strained into each jar, and a half teaspoon goes a long way.

The difference between using green chilies and red is there’s a bit of bitterness to greens. I like it. Some people don’t. Your loss. More chilies for me! You can also use frozen chilies for this. I have a big bag of Lufa Farms chilies in my freezer, pre-seeded and stemmed, just waiting for a moment to shine as chili sauce.

Don’t know what to do with it? French chefs use it in hollandaise sauces, some put it on hotdogs in place of ketchup, and nary a pho’ noodle soup should be served without a bottle to squeeze to taste. Apparently Applebee’s even serves it with mayonnaise for dipping fried shrimp. Not that I’m supporting Applebee’s, but spicy mayo is a good call. I’m going to say anything ending in “aise” probably works well with this tongue-tingling condiment. Let me know if you’d like a bottle and I’ll figure out how to get it to you.

Here’s the recipe adapted from Viet World Kitchen, in case you’ve got pounds and pounds of chili peppers sitting around, and pounds of patience.

Makes 1 ¼ cups

¾ pounds long green chilies, stems removed, chilies halved lengthwise and coarsely chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 ¼ teaspoons kosher salt
2 coconut sugar (or 1 tablespoon light brown sugar)
1/4 cup rice wine vinegar (or distilled vinegar)

1. Toss all the ingredients except the vinegar in a food processor and process (or chop by hand) until it looks like the consistency of consistency of oatmeal. You don’t want it too puréed, but the effort it takes to cut it all by hand is ridiculous, espcially when you doa  quadruple recipe of this, as I did.

Transfer the chopped chili mixture to a glass bowl or jar (or 4…) and cover with plastic wrap. Leave on the counter for 3 to 4 days, until small bubbles have formed under the mixture’s surface. If a little mold forms, lift it off with a fork or knife and discard. This usually happens on day 4 or 5, depending on the temperature of your kitchen, which is why at the end of the 4th day I sat with a fork at a dinner party at my house and picked the mold off one jar. It’s all perfect safe because of the next step, don’t worry.

Put the fermented mixture and rice vinegar into a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat to simmer for 5 minutes. This I also did at the dinner party, since it really couldn’t wait, what with that mold developing.

Remove from the heat and set aside to cool to room temperature. Transfer to a blender and puree for about 3 minutes. Add a little water to help it blend if needed.

Now the fun part…

Press the mixture through a fine-mesh strainer over a large bowl. Press with a spatular or large spoon to push as much liquid through as possible. You can stir in 1 tablespoon of water to thin it if you want. Let the flavor “develop and bloom” in the bowl for a few hours before using or storing. Taste it and make any flavor adjustment with salt, sugar or vinegar. Store in a jar (or 4…or 8 small jars) and keep refrigerated for 1 month (or frozen for 4 or 5). Bring it to room temperature before using.