Sweet Chilli Sauce

Sweet chili sauce is an excellent accompaniment to many oriental dishes, fish, prawns, or even just as a dip. In this recipe you can adjust the heat of the sauce by strategic use of the chili seeds. A really spicy sauce has all the seeds in it, as the seeds are where the majority of the heat in a chili lies, whereas a milder sauce will have few, if any, seeds. Also note that increasing the amount of sugar will make it sweeter, but will also lessen the spiciness of the chili.

3 garlic cloves, crushed
2 chili peppers
chili seeds of 1 chili pepper (optional)
200ml water
60ml white wine vinegar
10g ginger
2tsp salt
5tbsp sugar
1tbsp cornflour
2tbsp cold water


Step 1
Mix the cornflour and cold water into a paste, then set aside. Place all the other ingredients into a blender and purée them. Pour the contents of the blender into a saucepan and bring the mixture to a boil on a medium heat.  Reduce the heat to a simmer and cook for 2-3 minutes. Slowly whisk in the cornflour paste and simmer for another minute.

Step 2
Remove the mixture from the heat and allow to cool, then serve or pour into a container to store.



Another way to make this sauce is to create a syrup with sugar and water to serve as the thick suspension for the chili. Done in this way you would not need to create a cornflour paste.

Spicy Barbecue Sauce

A barbecue sauce can be very versatile if you get the consistency right. You can have it as a marinade, in which case it needs to be a little more runny, a dipping sauce, where it should be sticky and thick enough to coat the food, or anywhere in between. A good barbecue sauce can go on anything, be it chicken, hot dogs, or pizza, and this is a good barbecue sauce.


2 medium onions, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, crushed
2tsp paprika
2tsp cumin
1tbsp tomato puree
1x400g tin chopped tomatoes
350g tomato ketchup
1 red chilli, finely chopped
10g fresh ginger, finely chopped
300g soft brown sugar
1tbsp cooking oil
200ml water
200ml cider vinegar
Salt and pepper to season



Step 1
Heat the oil in a large saucepan, and when hot add the onion, garlic, ginger and half the chilli. Reduce to a medium heat, and stir well. Add the paprika, cumin, tomato puree, water, vinegar sugar and ketchup and mix, then pour in the tinned tomatoes through a sieve, pressing the pieces through with a wooden spoon. Reduce on a medium heat for 30 minutes.


The barbecue sauce is now ready to be used as a marinade or in cooking, or reduce it down some more and use it to coat foor for a barbecue, or reduce it a bit further to make a barbecue dip. Ther sauce is also easy to customise, so if you like it stronger or weaker in terms of spice you can put in more or less chilli. You could also try customising the sauce for specific meats, trying mint in it for lamb, or sage for chicken.