How to Make Chili Oil

This chili oil is seriously the most used condiment in our house right now. Everyone is addicted to it. I mean, we don’t put it on cake or in our tea, but it really goes onto just about every meal…

A few drops of chili oil on scrambled eggs or an omelet tops the breakfast off just right. I like putting a dash of chili oil into soups and salads. It is delicious in salad dressings or added to marinades. We drizzle it on baked potatoes, steamed veggies and stir fries.

Sprinkling a little chili oil on your food is a good thing when you look at all of the healing benefits of cayenne pepper

Cayenne Pepper Benefits

This chili oil is made with cayenne pepper (Capsicum annuum).

Sprinkling a little chili oil on your food is a good thing when you look at all of the healing benefits of cayenne pepper. Cayenne is antibacterial and helps to fight off colds. It is a cardiovascular tonic. Cultures that consume lots of capsicum spice have lower rates of cardio vascular disease.

Cayenne is high in vitamin C; it helps support digestion and also has significant antioxidant activity.

If you like spicy food, you are going to enjoy this recipe. On the other hand however, if spicy foods don’t agree with you, then this is not the recipe for you.

You can purchase cayenne pepper already powdered at Mountain Rose Herbs.

Or you can buy whole dried cayenne peppers and powder them yourself. Just don’t put your fingers in your eyes or actually anywhere near your face while handling the peppers.

To powder cayenne peppers yourself:

Split the peppers in half.
Get all the seeds out of the peppers.
Put the seedless peppers in a blender of coffee grinder and grind them into a powder. I can’t guarantee that the flavor of cayenne can be washed completely out of your coffee grinder. I have a coffee grinder that I use just for aromatic spices.

How to Make Chili Oil

Ingredients

4 tablespoons dried, powdered cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon vodka (any kind of vodka, cheap stuff or expensive stuff)
1 cup organic olive oil

Directions

Rehydrate the Cayenne

1. Put the dried, powdered cayenne into a bowl.

2. Rehydrate the powdered cayenne by stirring the vodka into the cayenne. This will help the cayenne easily infuse into the olive oil. The process of rehydrating the cayenne with vodka before blending it enhances the extraction process.

3. Let the moistened cayenne sit in a bowl for 1 hour with a lid on the bowl. Keep the bowl away from the window, open doors, heaters and direct light. Protect the rehydrating cayenne from breezes to prevent it from drying out. You want the cayenne to maintain the moisture during this hour.

Mix the Cayenne and Olive Oil

1. Put the moistened cayenne and olive oil into the blender.

2. Blend for 5 minutes.

3. Keep the oil and herbs in the blender for 24 hours and blend it 5 times for 5 minutes over the course of the day. I keep it on the counter and every time I am in the kitchen I turn on the blender for about 5 minutes or until the blender gets slightly warm. Be sure to use the highest blender speed. If you use a low blender speed, it will stress the blender.

Strain the Cayenne from the Olive Oil

1. Place a funnel into the opening of a clean, sterilized jar and lay a piece of muslin over the funnel. Be sure that the muslin piece is large enough to hang at least 2 inches over all sides of the funnel.

2. Pour the chili oil through the funnel and muslin to separate the oil from the powdered chili.

3. Squeeze all of the oil through the muslin into the jar.

4. When the oil has dripped through the funnel and muslin into the jar, you can compost the glob of mushy cayenne paste or you can put little bits of it into baggies and freeze it. Add it to pesto, humus, soups, enchilada sauces, and salsa. Beware, it is super spicy.

5. Pour the oil into a dispensing container that you can keep on your kitchen table.

This is what your kitchen looks like afterwards… Remember to keep your fingers out of your eyes while cleaning up. You are guaranteed to sneeze during this process.