Homemade Sriracha Sauce Recipe
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Sriracha is one condiment we always have stocked in the fridge. This is our homemade sriracha sauce recipe, which I find to be as good as (if not better) than the famous Huy Fong version.
In Vietnamese and Thai cuisine, sriracha is most commonly used as a dipping sauce or condiment for soups, noodles, and seafoods. It has also become a popular condiment in the US for burgers, fries, and tacos.
Sriracha was first introduced in Thailand in the 1940s in the town of Si Racha. Any guesses as to where the name for this hot sauce came from? However, the famous “rooster sauce” as we know it was actually developed in the 1980’s by David Tran, a Chinese-Vietnamese immigrant.
Using peppers grown on his brothers farm, David Tran began dabbling in homemade sauces during the mid 70’s. Shortly after, Huy Fong foods (and our beloved rooster sauce) was born.
Fun fact: The rooster on the bottle refers to the year David Tran was born (1945), “the year of the rooster.”
Due to supply issues, there have been multiple sriracha shortages reported over the years. We remember seeing bottles of sriracha listed for as high as $60 on eBay during the peak of the shortages! So, what is a pepper geek to do when one of their favorite condiments is difficult to find? Make your own of course!
Our homemade sriracha sauce is the perfect solution to bland food (or any sriracha shortage that may creep up again).
Sriracha Ingredients List
All of the ingredients to make your own homemade sriracha can be found at the grocery store. For the peppers, I suggest checking a specialty market like Whole Foods, or even better, your local farmer’s market.
Ingredients:
- 1.5 lb. red hot peppers – ~535g after de-seeding – classic sriracha is made with red jalapeƱo peppers. But, red jalapeƱos can be difficult to find unless you are growing your own. Red Fresno chiles, with their comparable color and heat level, are a perfect substitute.
- 3 large garlic cloves – fresh garlic cloves are fermented with the peppers for the best flavor payoff.
- 2 tbsp white sugar – ~25 grams – while not as sweet as sweet chili sauce, sriracha is a sweet sauce, so a bit of sugar is needed.
- 1 Tbsp. kosher salt – ~15 grams – salt is required not only for flavor, but for the fermentation process as well.
- 1/2 cup water (distilled or spring) – 115g – tap water can contain chlorine, which may hinder fermentation.
- 1/2 cup rice vinegar – many recipes call for white vinegar or apple cider vinegar. But, after experimenting, we loved the way rice vinegar tasted in this hot sauce recipe.
- 1 Tbsp. honey – honey helps contribute to the sweet profile and its flavor works well with the garlic and hot peppers.
How to make homemade sriracha
Prepare the peppers. Cut the red chilies lengthwise, removing the seeds and the pith. Slice the garlic.
Puree and ferment. For the best flavor, we recommend a short ferment. The classic zing of sriracha comes from the fermentation process. Fermenting is optional, but highly recommended (it takes about a week for this recipe). Puree the peppers and garlic, along with the sugar, salt, and water.
Transfer the mixture to a clean glass jar to ferment for about a week in a dark place at room temperature. It’s important to keep your ferment out of direct sunlight. Cover with an airlock lid or a clean cloth to allow gas to escape. Check in on the mixture every couple days as the sauce ferments.
Blend up the sauce. Once fermentation is complete, add to a high-powered blender with the vinegar and honey. Puree until blended and smooth. You can also use an immersion blender for this process.
Strain and deglaze. Strain the pepper mash with a fine mesh strainer into a saucepan or small pot and simmer over medium heat until the hot sauce is at the desired consistency. Season with salt to taste.
Add into hot sauces bottles and or airtight container and store into refrigerator for up to 6 months.
Fermentation tips
If fermentation is new to you, there are a few important things to know before getting started. These tips will help you avoid common mistakes and help you get the best tasting sriracha sauce possible.
- Oxygen is the enemy. Fermentation is essentially the slow, controlled breakdown of foods. By combining fresh produce with salt, and removing oxygen, you encourage lactobacillus to thrive and consume the carbohydrates in the food. Exposing the raw produce to oxygen during fermentation may invite mold to grow, potentially spoiling the ferment.
- Use fresh produce. Get the freshest produce possible for best results. Older peppers may have already begun to decompose, leading to a spoiled ferment.
- Allow for gas to escape. As the sauce ferments, it will produce CO2. If you seal your jars, they will build up pressure, potentially leading to an explosion. To avoid this, use an air exchange lid which allows gasses to escape, but not to enter back into the vessel.
- Make a cartouche. As an extra step against oxygen exposure, you can cover the top of your pepper mixture with a cartouche. Using parchment paper, cut a circle to the same size as your jar’s diameter, then cover the top of the ferment to block air exposure.
Should you cook the ferment for this hot sauce?
You may be wondering, why would you cook this ferment? Aren’t ferments meant to be eaten raw?
While you can skip the cooking process in this recipe (the sauce is perfectly fine to eat in it’s raw form), we love the flavor and the way the sauce thickens up in its cooked form. The choice is yours!
In addition to thickening the sauce and helping the flavors intensify, cooking also helps to halt the fermentation process. If you decide to leave the sauce uncooked, you may need to burp your jar occasionally unless you are using an airlock lid.
Hot sauce is one of our favorite homemade condiments. We actually did a blind taste test with a few friends, and our version came out ahead of some popular store-bought sauces. Once you make your own hot sauce, it’s hard to go back to anything you can buy in the store.
āOur other hot sauce recipes
Sriracha Hot Sauce
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1.5 lb red chiles red jalapeƱos or fresnos
- 3 large garlic cloves
- 1/2 cup water distilled or spring
- 2 Tbsp. sugar
- 1 Tbsp. kosher salt
- 1 Tbsp. honey
- 1/2 cup rice vinegar
Instructions
- Cut the red peppers lengthwise, removing the seeds and the pith. Slice the garlic.
- Puree the peppers and garlic along with the sugar, salt, and water and transfer the mixture into a jar. Press the mixture down with a spoon to release any air pockets.
- Cover jar with a clean cloth or airlock lid and leave to ferment at room temperature for about 1 week. Fermentation is optional but recommended for the best flavor.
- Once fermentation is complete, add to a blender with the vinegar and honey and blend on high until smooth.
- Strain the sauce through a fine-mesh strainer into a saucepan. Simmer over medium heat until the hot sauce reaches the desired consistency (slightly thickened is ideal), 10-15 minutes. Salt to taste.
- Add into hot sauces bottles or an airtight container and store in the refrigerator for up to 6 months.
Notes
- Fermentation is optional, but recommended for the richest flavor. 1 week is a relatively short fermentation, so feel free to extend the time to your tastes. Learn more about fermentation here.
- Pepper weight is about 535g (de-seeded), Water is 115g, Salt is 15g
Very pleasantly surprised. Used my own homegrown peppers the starter plants were labeled as Sriracha peppers. So I tried them out … they were a very thick walled JalapeƱo type pepper. I also used the rice vinegar in the recipe. I will definitely make another batch when more peppers come in . FYI – I cook all my pepper sauces outside on a hot plate for adequate ventilation.
Glad you enjoyed the hot sauce! That’s a great idea, we have been thinking of getting a hot plate for the same reason.
Totally new to fermenting. Usually water bath a honey garlic sriracha sauce with Fresno peppers I grow. Anyway am looking forward to trying this recipe out to give fermentation a try but am curious as to why strain the sauce as is outlined in step 5? Seems like a waste of yumminess. Is it just for consistency or is there a required reason due to the fermentation process? Thanks for the info!
The straining is just for consistency. You can totally leave it all in and just blend it up until it’s how you like it!
Cool. Thank you! I have my first batch fermenting as of yesterday. Looking forward to trying it in a week or so.
I have tried every source I can think of to find fresh fresno or red jalapeno chilies and cannot find any. Do you know of any vendors who sell fresh peppers? Also, I have already canned 15 jars of jalapeno peppers and have a boatload ready in the garden. Can I use those and pass it off as my “special green sriracha sauce”?
Sourcing them may be tricky on a smaller scale, but we sometimes get Fresnos from our local Whole Foods. Otherwise we usually just grow what we need or check local farmer’s markets. As for the green jalapeƱos, I don’t see why not, though I’m sure the flavor will be slightly different. Worth a shot since you already have so many pickled peppers.
All jalapenos will eventually turn red if left on the plant to mature long enough.
Could you make this with other peppers? We’ve got a bumper crop of sugar rush peach peppers growing and this sounds like it might be fun to try with!
Absolutely you can! That sounds like it would make a uniquely flavored sauce. Maybe we’ll try a fermented sugar rush sauce this season as well š
I am looking forward to making this sauce. Did you use white rice vinegar or one of the others, such as red, for additional flavor? Thanks.
We used white rice vinegar (unseasoned), enjoy the recipe!
Can you hot water bath it or pressure can it?
Can this be made with thai chilis? Or will that be too hot?
It will definitely be hotter! Also, removing all the seeds will be more time consuming, and you’ll need a whole lot of Thai chilies to get the job done. But it can definitely be done if you’re motivated!
If you leave the seeds & pith in, will the result be a hotter sauce?
The seeds can be bitter, but the pith definitely has lots of heat to it. If you want it spicy, leave that in.
Thank you!!
Absolutely, enjoy!
Did your fermenting today! 6 days to go!
The shortage of Sriracha was the owners fault he breached the contract with the grower and the grower sued.
That’s what you get, when your greedy!
Love this recipe, can’t wait to make it.
In general, could you please provide the ingredient amounts in European measurment units (e.g. grams). It could be an option, when I print the recipe to not only choose the amount, and font size, but to convert to metric units. Thanks. Great website and insightful youtube videos!
I’m knew to growing hot pepper’s. The Sriracha sauce,after you strain the sauce,can you use the mixture in the strainer to make seasoning. My 1st try at my pepper’s I did everything wrong,my 2nd set of pepper’s are looking like they should.I can’t wait to see if they turn out.Another question.I heard somewhere the frase 1 eyed creeper reaper,I would like to use it as a name of my sauce and seasoning.Then I’m going name each want each sauce and seasoning is.Do you have a problem with me using it. Don C Bower
Hi Don! You can definitely use the strained pulp, dehydrate it, and grind it into a powder – delicious, especially if you ferment the peppers first. As for the name, we don’t have any ownership of that name, so I can’t say one way or the other.