Hot Pepper Honey ~ an easy recipe that infuses the hot kick of spicy peppers into sweet honey for a fabulous pairing with cheese and crackers. This spicy honey is an essential part of any cheese board or platter.
One of our favorite simple pleasures around here is a good blue cheese on a cracker topped with honey. Another favorite is goat cheese paired with hot pepper jam, also on a cracker. This Hot Pepper Honey is part of a plan to fuse these two simple pleasures into one giant uber simple pleasure: tangy blue cheese meets sweet honey with a surprise kick.
It’s sweet. It’s fiery. It’s one of those ‘where has this been all my life’ tastes. The sweet cool honey hits the front of your tongue, the heat kicks in a moment later at the back of your mouth and it’s delightful.
There is a surprising amount of heat in the final product, considering that the peppers infuse for just a brief time in the warm honey, but the sweetness of the honey tempers the heat and results in a very pleasant sensation.
Making this is just a matter of gently heating the honey with the chili peppers so their flavors can mingle. The infused honey then gets strained, bottled, and voila—you have an amazing new condiment to experiment with, or a nifty little gift. And you know you’re going to need lots of nifty little gifts pretty soon.
Cheese plates often fill in as dinner at our house, and these kinds of special extras keep them them fun and interesting.
Use it in salad dressings, on cheese, or in glazes for meats, fish or vegetables. Put some in your mint or lemon tea, especially if you’ve got a cold. Drizzle a little on fresh figs, or how about slathering it all over a hot buttered biscuit?
I highly recommend this, it’s an unexpected treat.
I’d never heard of hot pepper honey until I read about a commercially made version in Culture Magazine. I slightly adapted the basic how-to from Foodista.
Minimal Monday: Hot Pepper Honey
Ingredients
- 1 cup honey
- about 3 tsp crushed red peppers, about 5 small dried peppers
Instructions
- Put the honey and the peppers in a double boiler or a glass bowl or measuring cup over a saucepan of boiling water.
- Mix the peppers into the honey and heat for several minutes until the temp is about 150F. A thermometer isn't necessary, but you don't want the honey to get so hot that you destroy the beneficial enzymes. Turn off the heat and let the honey sit over the water and steep for about 10 minutes.
- While the honey is still warm, strain it into a clean jar or jars.
I was looking for ways to use my bumper crop of hot peppers and am thrilled! We have made candied bacon with it, used it on ham sandwiches, drizzled it on roasted corn with butter and like juice, basted it on grilled pork, and created some amazing cocktails! I forgot that it is the bomb on cornbread too!!!!! Easy and so versatile. Truly kicks up the game in our cuisine!!!!!
I love to hear this Denyse, you’ve gotten so creative with it! I need to try it on corn, that sounds amazing…
It looks amazing! Do you have to strain out the chillies ? Can you just leave them in it?
You can leave them in, for sure.
i have a question if your still on here i made pepper honey and the recipe says to refridgerate . i didnt think youhad to refridgerate honey??
I’m not sure where you’re seeing that, you can store your honey at room temperature if you like!
If you wanted to make a larger batch for gifts, would you need to process the jars of honey in a canner???
I’m not sure, Margaret, but if you start with clean dry jars, it should keep a couple of months, I would think.
For hot-taste lovers like me this seems to be the perfect honey. I will definitely prepare your recipe! Thanks for sharing!
I love this idea! My cousin makes a fantastic jalapeno jelly and I keep meaning to ask for her recipe. I love the heat alongside the sweet condiments.