“The time has come the walrus said to talk of other things,
of sauce and chips and sealing jars,
red chilies and their sting!”
It’s the end of a cold blistery winter on the plains of North India, and now is the best part of the year. Spring is in the air, albeit for just a clutch of days, and is a celebration of flower beds bursting with colour, birds, butterflies, vibrant fresh produce, making the atmosphere ideal for all things creative. This is the time to make the most of the few good days before the searing summer heat descends on us. 
The bazaars are bursting with farm fresh vegetables and the overladen baskets of ripe red tomatoes {prices at ridiculous as Rs 4 a kilo in Hyderabad, 1$=Rs44}, bell peppers and red chilies tempt you to do something with them. For long I’ve wanted to make a Sriracha style sauce posted on White on Rice’s beautiful blog. Have searched high and low for tiny hot Thai red chillies, but it’s proved futile as they remain elusive here … Then one day, to my rescue came my knight in shining armour – as always, good old Twitter! 
A tweet for ‘an alternative to Thai red chilies’ had the super talented & lovely Leela @ She Simmers suggest I could use red jalapeños. Now why did I never think of that? A quick check of the red chilies at the local vendor gave me hope, lots of it. Cross checking with a few vendors I was able to confirm that the heat element in the local red chili peppers is far greater than that in the green ones. I was soon back armed with 250gms of the prettiest red chilies priced at a ridiculous Rs 15 {30cents}.
This post is written with Sana in mind, a sweet reader of my blog, who writes to me often for advice, with feedback, with appreciation and makes me believe that I have made a difference to her culinary happiness. She asked me the other day if I could post something with the local red chilies that are flooding the market, something other than red chili pickle she asked! This dipping sauce is for her, and she’s offered to send me her MILs stuffed red chili pickle recipe. Who would ever imagine that life can be so fulfilling & delicious. Who was to know that a few red chilies can make a difference!!
IMHO, you can live with Sriracha, but you can’t live without it!! I had longed to make this delicious dipping sauce, a sauce which works well with seafood of course, but also beautifully with other batter fried foods, Indian pakoras/fritters, batter fried onion rings {my son’s fave}, olive oil crackers {the daughters fave}, fried fish/chicken, buttermilk breaded chicken, to give mayonnaise or a marinade a chili kick, in a sandwich, with burgers, lavished in a chicken/cottage cheese roll. It offers Asian fusion at its best!! Though an Asian sauce, it works beautifully with most cuisines; after all what’s not to love about chili-garlic-sweet? Did I forget French fries with sweet chili spiked tomato sauce?
With thanks to Todd & Diane for the several inspired posts of Asian foods and sauces, I stopped on the recipe page of sweet chili dipping sauce in my Thermomix recipe book. With basic ingredients that can be found on shelves in every home, this is a great accompaniment to spice up your platter. Use the recipe as a guide and play around with quantities to suit your palette.
Sriracha is the name for a Thai hot sauce named after the coastal city of Si Racha, in the Chonburi Province of central Thailand, where it was first produced for dishes served at local seafood restaurants. It is a paste of chili peppers, distilled vinegar, garlic, sugar and salt. Sriracha is a common condiment in many Asian restaurants and increasingly found in American and European homes.
Traditional Thai Sriracha tends to be tangier, sweeter, and thicker in texture (higher viscosity) than non-Thai. In Thailand, Sriracha is frequently used as a dipping sauce.
Keep the seeds in if you like it hot, or deseed the red chili peppers to make the sauce milder. Taste as you go seems to be the mantra as with most sauces. I’ve made this a couple of times. 
The first time I found it to be a little runny, so I thickened it with some cornflour mixed in water, and cooked it till it got to the right consistency. Not sure if this was the right or the purists way of doing it, but it worked fine for me. The next time I just simmered it over low heat till it looked right. I do love the pretty colour it has, vibrant and exciting.
Sriracha Style Sweet Chili Dipping Sauce
A sweet chili-garlic dipping sauce inspired by the famous and addictive Thai dipping sauce, Sriracha. {Adapted from Thermomic, Everyday Cooking For The Family}
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 45 minutes
60 minutes
Yield: 2 jars
None
Ingredients
- 12 Large red chili peppers, seeded if you like & roughly cut
- 120gm Brown sugar {might need extra}
- 60ml Hot water
- 10 cloves Garlic {adjust as per taste; we love garlic}
- 120ml White vinegar
- 2 tsp Salt {or sea salt}
- 2 tbsp Fish sauce {I did not use it}
Instructions:
- Chop the red chili peppers with a pair of kitchen scissors and soak in water for 15 minutes. {You can deseed them to reduce the heat if you wish. Alternatively, you can increase the sugar at a later stage if you like... or both}. Drain well.
- Puree all ingredients {except fish sauce if using} in food processor. {For Thermomix, puree for 20 seconds on speed 8}
- Simmer for 30-45 minutes. {For TM, cook for 15 minutes at 90C on Reverse + speed soft}. Adjust salt/sugar if required.
- Cool, add fish sauce if using and pour into jars {I store mine in the fridge.}
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This homemade chili sauce looks gorgeous! I cannot live without my chili sauces….
Cheers,
Rosa
So thoughtful of you Deeba to dedicate the post to your reader! Love the rustic looks of each click. Lovely spread, might as well use it for my Pasta, Noodles and many more dishes. But I don’t get this variety of red chilly pepper here..have to wait till I find some.
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Oh you know I am making this! You are a tease. Chili sauces are so precious and this one sounds perfect.
O that looks so beautiful Deeba! Gorgeous photos and that little pan/pot is just precious!
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Amazing clicks , chilli sauce looks fiery but perfect,
This chilli sauce looks awesome!!!
Hi Deeba! I love these photos! They are so gorgeous!
Hot sauce always works for me!
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Deeba, heard so much about sriracha sauce never tried it , seems very delicious .
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Just made this – serving to friends this evening over nachos and sprinkled with cheese and refried beans – is so yummmm!! Had Chilli-Jam the other day and now in search for a good recipe to re-create it…let me know if you have one. thanks and yes, your pics are out of this world….
Hubbykins just loves sriricha, but its so hard to find here in the UK. THanks for posting this awesome recipe daaaaahling.
I’m doing a give away on my blog, do stop over and enter!
*kisses* HH
I ADORE sriracha and like to put it on EVERYTHING from pizza to mac & cheese to fried noodles. Great homemade version!
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The whole post looks so spicy to look at… Thats a great sauce Deeba
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I miss red chili peppers. It’s close to impossible where I am at currently
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This looks amazing! Love the pictures of bright red chillies.I like siracha just the way u ve whipped it ..sweet & spicy What a beautiful first picture of sauce jar sitting on a wood ladder.Just so gorgeous.
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What’s not to love about hot sauce? And I am seriously in love with these photos. Just stunning!
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You’ve really gotten my heart racing and taste buds tingling with this beautiful recipe, Deeba. I’m going to try red jalapenos for this one. Love the touch of fish sauce here!
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I always wanted to make this sauce. These chilllies are definitly unique in taste and character. Very distinct so there is really no substitute!
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Stunning photos! Love the use of the weathered fencing with the red hot peppers. You are really developing a great eye with the camera!
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Dee I love everything you make and love ur pictures, but this truly is my fav pictures from your blog. Just love it!
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Sriracha is my go-to sauce each and every day! Ketchup is too sweet and mayo is often too bland, but Sriracha… so useful! Last time I added some of it to a butter & onion tomato sauce, just yum!
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I LOVE red chilly and without spice I can’t survive .. too dramatic !! yeah
I just want to say that I am your FAN .. huge huge FAN .. love your styling .. your photography .. you should give us some gyan on this .. it would be so helpful for people like us
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I just love the redness of this photography, just brilliant!
this red hot spicy sauce is the one I would like to try.
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Your pictures are always so beautiful and delicious. I know this sauce is just as delicious.
Haven’t visited your blog for a while, we were on vacation. Love all of your pictures. They are so nice. Will come back to read all the great posts that I have missed
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Very colourful and tempting. The chillies look full of flavour, so I can imagine how delicious the sauce turned out!
It’s quite amazing that you’ve made sriracha at home. It’s such a staple for us we should really try this out!
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I certainly like it hot & you;ve got my taste-buds in a frenzy right now. Beautiful photos!
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Oh my! I just discovered your blog, and your photography is out of this worl GORGEOUS! Wow. The chilis are such a beautiful red, and the way you arranged them is just genius. The recipe looks great too–I recently started using sriracha and love the stuff. =)
Gorgeous, GORGEOUS pictures, Deeba! I absolutely love that beautiful old tin to bits.
What a great idea to substitute the red Jalapenos for the thai chillies. This is such a great recipe will have to try it soon because I do like it hot! Your photos are absolutely gorgeous, love them.
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My goodness Deeba. These pictures are works of art! Just gorgeous! This sauce looks pretty darn gorgeous as well. I can almost taste it!
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Peppers never looked more beautiful I can only imagine how amazing the sauce must be.
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Deeba., I’m so going to make this. I love a good sweet chilli dipping sauce
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Look absolutely nice and delicious Deeba, send you huggs! gloria
like always amazing pictures!
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Especially love your photos and mosaics today, Deeba. That red is wonderful!
I’m not much for hot and spicy, but this looks great!
Your series of photos just blow me away! Gorgeous!!! And yum I love this kind of sweet chili sauce. Fabulous recipe and post, darling! Now I have to go back and look at the pictures again…
Your pictures speak a thousand words! simply SUPER!
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OMG i have to make this. I use chili paste, garlic paste and any combination of those in almost 99% of my cooking. I know this is dipping sauce but this just looks like you can add a little to the stir fry, soup etc. Fabulous.
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Deeba, u r my bible for baking……ve learnt so much from ur blog.GREAT WORK……luv ur pics!!!
What a fabulous cup! Love the rich textures in these photos. Thanks for stopping by and introducing me to your site.
Hey Deeba, I was looking for the recipe to make this sauce but cannot read it. There is some message instead of the recipe. Can you please fix it or mail the recipe to me? Thanks!
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Sorry Harini & Sayantani, it’s up now! My apologies. It was a plug in error.
Thank you, Deeba! Will note it for reference.:)
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Deeba am having the same problem as Harini. wanted to make this but its not visible. please help.
Sorry Sayantani, it’s up now! My apologies. It was a plug in error.
thanks for this help. am planning to mak it as soon as I get some good red chillies.
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I?m now not sure the place you’re getting your info, but good topic. I must spend some time learning much more or working out more. Thanks for great information I used to be searching for this information for my mission.
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hello mam,
can i use regular sugar instead of brown sugar and did you soak the red chillies in 60ml hot water or in cold water confused here. please take your time for replying
warm regards and thanks.