Preserving – Chillies

It’s mid June and I am still harvesting chillies, YAY! but I don’t think it can last too much longer.  I have a few plants with tiny chillies on them but their growth seems to have stalled.  Otherwise I am just awaiting the last of the others to ripen.  The plants will then stay pretty much dormant until in starts to warm up Spring when they should put on new growth – that’s if it doesn’t get too cold for them over winter first.  They still look pretty good at the moment so I am quite hopeful that most will make it through.

In my most recent harvest I did get enough to preserve a few for cooking.  One of the easiest ways I have found to draw out the chilli season is to process ripe chillies with a teaspoon of salt and a splash of vinegar and keep them in a sterilised jar in the fridge.  You can then add this to any recipe using chillies.  It is similar to the Indonesian Sambal Olek.

For more information on growing chillies and details on how to dry them please see my earlier Chilli post: http://suburbantomato.com/2011/04/growing-chillies-in-melbourne/