So, WE LOVE CHEESE. And we find no cheese board is complete without bread and some good chutneys.
Today we have decided to make a batch of onion chutney with a bit of a kick ready for all the Christmas activities (and cheese eating). Rather than your everyday red onion chutney we have decided to go for a smoother jam with a few chilies to give it some extra heat and flavour. We are both big fans of a homemade chili jam (with goes with everything) and this is just a bit of an expansion on that.
For this you will need sterilised jars, the best way to do this is by putting them in the dishwasher. alternatively you can soak them in boiling water with a little washing up liquid. Put your sterilised jars in a low oven for about 10 minutes before use – the heat will continue the sterilisation and prepare your jars for the hot jam you’re about to put in them and help prevent them from cracking.
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp butter
- 1kg red onions, finely chopped
- 4 clove garlic, finely chopped
- 5-6 red chillies, deseeded and very finely chopped
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 tbsp tomato purée
- 1 tbsp worcestershire sauce
- 50ml balsamic vinegar
- 250ml red wine vinegar
- 400g jam sugar
- season to taste
- Sterilise your empty jars
- In a large, deep saucepan melt the butter with the oil on a medium heat and fry the onions until softened and translucent.
- Add your garlic and chillies and continue to cook for a few minutes.
- Stir in the tomato puree, worcestershire sauce and seasoning until all combined.
- Add the bay leaves, vinegars and sugar and allow the sugar to dissolve.
- Bring to a high boil for around 10 minutes, checking every now and again that the onions aren't catching at the bottom.
- Leave to simmer 15-20 minutes, stirring occasionally, your jam should have thickened by now and be 'jam-like'.
- Pour into your sterilised jars and seal whilst they're still hot.
We recently used ours to go on the top of some goats cheese and bacon profiteroles. Add if we do say so ourselves, it is a wonderful use of the jam….
I have just made this, and although I’m happy with the flavour, I think I have managed to make it more liquid than I wanted or you intended. To illustrate, it was never on a proper jam-like rolling boil – it just bubbled vigorously, and I kept it doing that for longer than the recipe recommends. I used pectin-added supermarket jam sugar. Am I expecting too much for it to behave so similarly to regular fruit jam? What should I tweak first to make it more “jam-like”?
I’m sorry I’m new to jam but would love to try this recipe! What do you mean by jam sugar? Will cane sugar work?
Hi Madison! Definitely a good recipe to start with, jam sugar is sugar that also has pectin in it which helps the jam set. It;s also sometimes called gelling sugar. We hope you can get your hands on some and give the recipe a go!
Thank you for the response! Which kind of chilies did you use? And my local stores only carry pectin, do you know the ratio of pectin to sugar? Sorry for the 21 questions !
Ask all the questions you need, we’re happy to help!! We use standard red chilies in packs from the supermarket which are usually Serrano ones (if you want more of a kick you can always use a spicier variety). As for the pectin, with this recipe calling for 400g sugar you would likely need about 2tsp of the pectin but it’s best to follow the directions on whatever brand of pectin you pick up, as it can very between powder and liquid forms!
Thank you so much for all of your help!! I ended up using 2 tsp pectin and 4 serrano peppers and 2 jalapeños and the flavor was amazing, but not spicy! Made it for my Christmas and gifted to my family in little jars and they loved it. My family doesn’t like spice so I substituted some jalapeños to keep it mild.. .but I couldn’t help but to lick the spoon and the pot. SO GOOD.
Hi Madison! We hope you had a great christmas and new year, we’re so happy that you and your family really enjoyed this recipe!
[…] Baking a Mess https://www.bakingamess.co.uk/ This recipe works perfectly fine with shop bought onion chutney or jam, you can just use your favourite one, preferably one with smaller pieces of onion and it can get messy when spooning on top of the profiteroles. We decided to use our own homemade onion jam. […]