With the idea of hot pepper jelly lingering in the back of my mind, I went to the market looking for fresh, juicy and cheerful red and yellow Surinamese peppers. You see, I was about to make the first Surinamese pepper jelly, ever. Something I knew didn’t exist yet.

There are plenty Madame Jeanette sambal recipes online. You also have quite a few pepper jelly’s online, but none of them use Mme. Jeanette’s, who, by the way, are always yellow and never red. If it’s red, it ain’t no Mme. Jeanette.

I also turned it into a, what we call, a halva jam—a less sweet jelly. Preparing this is very pungent, consider yourself warned.

Opposed to what you might think, this is not a crazy hot jelly. Granted, it does have a really serious kick to it, but mainly there’s this fantastic balance between sweet, sour and spicy that makes this jelly totally irresistible.

Ingredients:

3 Mme. Jeanette’s
3 Adjoemas (red Surinamese peppers)
1 red bell pepper
1 1/2 cup + 2 tbsp white vinegar
6oz / 170gr geleisuiker speciaal (half sweet sugar with added pectin)
or 9.8oz / 280gr regular jam sugar with added pectin

Make sure you check the instructions of whatever sugar you use. Yours might be different!

Directions:

This makes for one 12oz/350ml jar. You might want to consider doubling or even tripling this recipe.

I love hot peppers. Oh, the haze is just a little artistic freedom. I was bored.

 
My momma didn’t raise no fool, so I wore gloves. And when you’re working with 6 seriously hot peppers, you might want to consider wearing them too. Just sayin’.
 

Remove the seeds and membranes from all peppers.

Put everything into your food processor bowl and blitz until it’s almost a puree.

 
This will be pungent. Seriously pungent. Brace yourself.
 

There we are. Bright and hot. I caught a whiff and could barely breathe.

Transfer the peppers to a saucepan.

Add the vinegar.

Bring it to a boil over high heat, lower the temperature and simmer the pepper mix for 10 minutes.

Strain the liquid and strain it untouched or it will become cloudy.

You should end up with about 1 1/2 cup lovely orange liquid. Now store it next to the carrot juice.

 
Just kidding!
 

Pour the liquid into a pan.

Add the sugar.

Bring it to a boil white stirring now and then.

Let the jelly simmer until it reaches 105C° (157F°).

Then  I found out that my new Kilner thermometer wasn’t working properly. It went up to 100C° and from thereon the temperature kept dropping.

 
Good thing I always keep a few spoons in my freezer to test jelly. Just drop some on the back of a spoon, let it cool off for a minute and run your finger through it. If it wrinkles, the jelly is done. Mine did end up more solid than it should have been. Later on I also found out the new Kilner jars were leaking. Lovely.
 

You’ll need a sterilised 12oz/350ml jar.

 
I actually use my old baby bottle microwave steriliser for this! Works like a charm.
 

Pour the jelly syrup into the jar.

Seal the jars and let them cool off completely.

This jelly is pure, unadulterated bright orange love.

What to use it on? Yes, I could hear you asking!

At first I merely used it on top of cream-cheese-laden whole wheat crackers…. but now I add it to marinades, stir-fry sauces, stews and even spruce up my gravy with this.

 
Kay’s Recipe Card

Click here for printable size.