Habanero Honey

Here is an idea I stumbled on pretty much by accident last year. The preparation is easy but the time you have to wait after that is on the high side. I hope some of you find it useful.

I'd grown a load of habanero plants and they were all fruiting at once so I was looking for different ways of preserving them. There's only so many of them you can eat in one day after all. Actually i've still got half a bottle of the habanero papaya and rum sauce that came out of the same few weeks but thats not the point. Someone had mentioned that it was possible to preserve fruit in honey so I thought i'd give it a shot.

A few months down the line things had changed a little inside the jars, the honey seemed a lot thinner and the fruits were becoming wrinkled and translucent. It seems the honey had been pulling a lot of the moisture out of the chillies and bringing a lot of the flavour and heat with it. The honey had become a wonderful spiced fruity substance, ideal for marinades and glazes. One other point of interest is that although it has a pleasant warm burn to it, it takes a lot more of the fruity flavour of the habaneros than it does of the heat. Oh and its great poured over vanilla ice cream too. I've not figured out what to do with the candied chillies yet but they are surely going to be great for something or other.

Instructions:

You will need:

Sealable jars (old jam jars are fine) and enough clear honey to fill them.
Fresh habaneros; I was using about 4 medium fruit per 250g jar.

Steps:

Sterilise your jars, half an hour in the oven at 250f should do it. Lids should be resting on top of the jars but not twisted tight.

Put your fruit in a deep bowl. Boil a kettle of water and pour it over them. Drain after about 30 seconds. You are not cooking them, you are just killing anything on the surface.

Drop a few of the fruit into each jar, fill the jars with honey and seal them immediately. Put them in a cupboard you use every week or so and turn them over once in a while when you remember to.

I'd give it 6 months before you crack one open and give it a try.

Wow!
Great idea, I will try this one for sure.

I usually put some chillis in sherry for about 6 months, a few drops is a great way to warm up those winter soups.

Wow Adam this sounds great. I am just imagining all the things this would be useful for. Maybe a glaze for chicken or chicken wings. I love the hot and sweet combination.

Thanks for sharing!

Yeah since then I have pretty much gone into mass production. Flavour of the month is smoking sections of pork belly over oak for about 6 hours at 230F and regularly painting them with the habanero honey throughout the cooking time. Got to the point where I am doing batches of 8 and passing most of them on to my mates who can't seem to get enough of them. Here is a not particularly good picture of one of them: