Kitchen Garden Forum

hi - can anyone suggest a way of preserving chillis in oil? - i was told to simply cover them in olive oil- but they seemed to smell to the degree that I threw some away! - am I doing it wrong? - any help would be welcome

I just put mine in a bag in the freezer and they keep for years. I grew some jalapeno peppers a few years ago and must have got a couple of kilos, which I froze, and I'm still using them. They don't deteriorate and are still very hot.

I tried preserving garlic in oil and that went rather strange - funny smell and texture - so I threw it out.

Not much help am I?

Hi - yes you are lots of help -
I got a similar reaction by placing them in oil - very strange smell - decided not to eat them ! -do you freeze them in 1 piece or cut them into pieces or blanch them etc - would be interested to know but freezing sounds the business- do you defrost them prior to use or use them from frozen ? thanks :

I made sure they were clean and dry so they don't stick together, and put them straight in a bag whole. I get one out and you can cut them up straight away, but it is a bit easier if you leave them for a minute or two.

I made a chillie and sweet pepper jelly for use with whatever you fancy. Can't find he receipe cos I lost all mine when my motherboard imploded...but I think it's on the recepies here somewhere.

It does stink the house out for a while so keep the doors and windows open..but it's very tasty and you can make it as hot as you like. Remeber though, the longer you leave it in the jars, the hotter it becomes.

Try this one

viewtopic.php?t=716

stimpy_mo wrote:hi - can anyone suggest a way of preserving chillis in oil? - i was told to simply cover them in olive oil- but they seemed to smell to the degree that I threw some away! - am I doing it wrong? - any help would be welcome

I presume you were trying to preserve chillis for use later in the year. I tried this once and the result was the same as yours.

Since then I have done some research and found out what was going wrong.

Olive oil does not, in itself, preserve. It excludes air, but, if you put raw vegetables in it, the bacteria on them continue to breed anaerobically (i.e. without air) and turn the vegetables rotten - and potentially lethal (well, at least nasty).

The Italians have two methods of preserving/pickling - one is sott'aceto (=under vinegar), the other is sott'olio (=under oil). In both of these methods the vegetables are first cooked to kill off bacteria. If they are to be preserved in oil they have to be very carefully handled to avoid further bacterial contamination.

Things preserved sott'olio are intended to be eaten as a starter rather than being used like the fresh form. I have long been a fan of carciofi sott'olio, but prefer to buy them rather than make them. Note the warning in the recipe in the above link about killing people

If you want to keep chillies to use in cooking there are two options:

1 Do like others have suggested above and freeze them

2 Dry them ((which I always do - they keep for two years at least).

I researched this last year, and came up with lots of differing advice, the most important of which is DON"T try making this at home with fresh chillis and oil! you risk growing botulinum toxin-producing bacteria, which is all very well if you are very wrinkly and need to make your own botox, but lethal if ingested.Most advice was to wash the fresh chillis thoroughly, then dry them until completely hard and crisp, then heat them up in the oil, allow to cool and put into sterilised jars. The heating in oil varied from frying for a few minutes to simmering for 2 hours!. I did try it, and stored it in the fridge, but it did grow mould after a month, so I threw it out. Many of the cookery websites recommend buying commercially made chilli oil and drying your own chillis for use in cooking. If you fry dried chilli in oil, you can use the oil straight away for dressings, dips etc.

Freeze them, dry them or make them into jellies or jam. Like garlic, they're unreliable in oils or vinegar as far as home preserving goes.

The only time I tried to preserve chillis in oil they went very manky and I had to chuck them away. Now I simply freeze them whole in a bag. They store well for a couple of years like this and can simply be taken out and chopped up as needed.

I chop mine when fresh and freeze in little foil parcels - you can then just empty them straight into the pan. It means you only get "chilli fingers" once when you chop a batch

I don't preserve them in oil

Can I suggest hot smoking them? Fantastic flavour when put into burgers or sauces.

We hot smoked and then froze a load of ours.