Sriracha sauce Thailand

Ingredients for 1 servings:

• 250 g pepper, red, long, medium hot
• 30 g garlic cloves
• 30 g ginger (see note)
• 3 tbsp palm sugar, brown
• 150 g water
• 2 g vegetable stock powder
• 2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
• 2 tbsp lime juice, freshly squeezed
• 1 tbsp light fish sauce (e.g. kecap ikan “King Lobster”)
• 5 kaffir lime leaves, fresh or frozen
• 1 tsp, heaped tapioca flour
• 1 tbsp rice wine (Arak Masak)
• n. B. flowers and leaves

Instructions

Working time approx. 20 minutes; Rest period approx. 7 days; Cooking/baking time approx. 20 minutes; Total time approx. 7 days 40 minutes

The homemade sauce tastes considerably better than the store-bought kind. So, let’s get to those chilies.

Wash the chili peppers (“the large chilies”) and trim the stems. Trim and peel the garlic cloves at both ends. Wash, peel, and thinly slice the ginger crosswise. Place the water in a pot and bring to a boil. Dissolve the vegetable broth in it and simmer the ingredients, from the chili peppers to the ginger, in a colander with a lid for 15 minutes. Place the remaining ingredients up to the fish sauce, including the cooking water, in a blender and puree on the lowest setting for 2 minutes (this avoids destroying the hard seeds). Return to the pot and simmer with the lime leaves for 15 minutes. Dissolve the tapioca flour in the rice wine and stir into the simmering broth. After one minute, strain the broth and pass it through a fine sieve. Transfer to a sterile bottle and seal it tightly. Let it mature at room temperature in a dark place for one week. This process causes fermentation, which enhances the flavor of the sriracha. I then poured the sriracha sauce into an ice cube tray and froze it. Thaw one or more pieces as needed. Note: In Thailand, coriander roots are often used in sriracha. I’m less keen on coriander and substituted ginger instead.