This sweet-savory homemade Irish Chilli Sauce, my great-great-aunt's recipe, is delicious on burgers and sandwiches. We found Chilli Sauce on several menus during our trip to Ireland.
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This trip took me to what was one of my most exciting destinations. (The bar was set pretty high after our family's impulsive jaunt to Old San Juan, Puerto Rico.)
I traveled with my mother and sister to Ireland, where we started our trip in the northwestern region of Donegal and then visited Ballyshannon, the birthplace of a famous '70s Irish rock guitarist. And that's where we found Chilli Sauce.
The Chilli Sauce details and recipe are below—after that, keep scrolling to read the story of our Ireland travels in Donegal and Ballyshannon!
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Why you'll love this recipe
This is a family recipe handed down from Great-Great-Aunt Lizzie Reilly who lived in Hoosick Falls, New York. (We have her to thank for many family recipes including Irish Soda Bread and Molasses Cookies!) This homemade Irish Chilli Sauce is a favorite, and it's loaded with veggies like tomatoes and peppers, plus a little sugar and spice.
The sauce is simmered slowly to create a thick, chunky, sweet-savory sauce. Chilli Sauce is really delicious on burgers, grilled meats, and veggies. Or, try it the way we had it in Ballyshannon, Ireland—tossed with cooked, shredded chicken and served on a soft bap roll.
Speaking of burgers...
Steamed Cheeseburgers
When in central Connecticut, get a taste of this unique, regional burger.
🔪 How to make Chilli Sauce
Ingredients:
- Tomatoes: Use the freshest tomatoes you can find to give the sauce incredible flavor. It's the perfect recipe to make when summer tomatoes are ripe!
- Bell Peppers: I use both red and green bell peppers to give the sauce extra color.
- Jalapeños: This recipe makes a large batch; one jalapeño in the mix adds just a hint of heat.
- Onions: Yellow, white, or Spanish onions all work well. Here's how to quickly chop onions with a sharp kitchen knife into an even dice.
- Vinegar: A splash of white vinegar adds tang and acidity to Chilli Sauce.
- Sugar: There's a balance of sweet and savory flavor in Chilli sauce, much like that of ketchup. Granulated sugar brings the sweetness.
- Spices: Like ketchup, ground cloves and cinnamon give Chilli Sauce its unique flavor. A little cayenne pepper adds a spicy note and salt helps all of the ingredient flavors really shine.
Scald the tomatoes
Slice an X in the bottoms of the tomatoes and drop them into boiling water for a minute.
Fish them out and when they're cool, remove the peels.
Cut the vegetables
Slice the peeled tomatoes along with the peppers and onions. Place these in a stock pot with the sugar, vinegar, and spices.
Simmer the sauce
Stir and simmer the sauce for about an hour. You can let the finished sauce cool to store it in the fridge or preserve and can the sauce using a hot water bath method.
FAQs
The flavor of this Chilli Sauce is similar to that of ketchup. It has a blend of sweet and savory flavors, including cinnamon and cloves. The recipe does include one jalapeño pepper and a dash of cayenne, but these add only a tiny bit of heat. This is not a spicy Chilli Sauce. (Although, you can also always choose to add more jalapeño and cayenne if you want to make it spicy!)
Yes, you should absolutely refrigerate Chilli Sauce once it cools, to protect the flavor and quality. It's loaded with chopped veggies and has sugar too—these ingredients will not hold up well if left for an extended period at room temperature. If you like to can veggies and jams, you have the option of water bath canning Chilli Sauce to preserve it for longer.
These sauces are not the same, although they do have some flavors in common. Cocktail sauce is made with ketchup; the tomatoes, spices, and sweetness of ketchup can all be found in Chilli Sauce. However, cocktail sauce also contains Worcestershire sauce, lemon juice, and a spicy kick from horseradish and hot sauce. Cocktail sauce is blended until smooth, whereas Chilli Sauce is chunky.
Tip
This sauce is delicious spooned over hotdogs or burgers, over grilled chicken, or tossed with shredded chicken. You can also make an appetizer by spooning the sauce over a block of cream cheese and serving it as a spread with crackers.
The easy Chilli Sauce recipe is below! Here are more stories and recipes of Ireland to try:
💬 Did you make and devour this recipe? Leave a comment below.
📖 Recipe
Chilli Sauce
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Ingredients
- 3 pounds tomatoes
- 2 bell peppers (I like to do one red and one green)
- 2 yellow onions (about 12 ounces)
- 1 jalapeño pepper
- ½ cup white vinegar
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
Instructions
Blanch and peel tomatoes
- Bring 4 quarts of water to a boil in a large pot. While you wait for the water, use a sharp knife to cut an "X" into the bottoms of the tomatoes.
- When the water is boiling, drop in the tomatoes (in batches if necessary) and leave them in for one minute. Remove the tomatoes from the water with a slotted spoon to a colander set in the sink. When all the tomatoes have been scalded, discard the boiling water and hold the pot aside.
- When the tomatoes are cool enough to handle, peel the skins back from the "X" and remove them. Slice the tomatoes into chunks that are about 1½ inches in size (be sure to cut out the tough core where the stem was) and place the tomato chunks into the pot.
Cut the veggies
- Remove the stems, seeds and membranes from the bell peppers. Dice the peppers and add them to the pot. Peel and discard the papery skins from the onions. Dice the onions and add them to the pot as well.
- Slice open the jalapeño. Remove the seeds and membranes. Dice the pepper and add it to the pot.
Simmer the sauce
- Add in the rest of the ingredients: the vinegar, sugar, salt, cloves, cinnamon, and cayenne and stir everything together. Place the pot over medium-high heat and bring the contents to a boil.
- Once this happens, reduce the heat to low - the sauce should stay at a low simmer so adjust the heat as necessary to achieve this.
- Simmer the sauce over low heat for 1 hour, stirring it often. The vegetables will soften and the liquid will reduce and thicken. And your kitchen will smell incredible.
- After an hour, remove the pot from the heat and let the sauce cool. Ladle the sauce into jars and keep them sealed or covered in the fridge. It will last for weeks.
- Makes about 4 cups.
- You can also ladle hot sauce into jars for canning using mason jars and a hot water processing method.
Notes
- This sauce is delicious spooned over hotdogs or burgers, over grilled chicken or tossed with shredded chicken. You can also make an appetizer by spooning the sauce over a block of cream cheese and serving it as a spread with crackers.
Nutrition
Ireland: Flying into Shannon Airport
Deciding on the trip dates was easy, but deciding where to go in Ireland was much more difficult. There are so many sites and towns we wanted to see, and it felt impossible to narrow down where to go in just one week's time!
Little by little, with help from Rick Steves and Lonely Planet travel guides we honed in on places to visit, and my mother scouted out sweet little B&Bs where we could stay.
We chose a route that would begin at the airport in Shannon, and then meander mostly through the north and west of Ireland, plus one quick dash over to Dublin on the east coast. And the first town on the agenda was Donegal. (Dún na nGall)
We arrived at Shannon airport so excited to begin—and a little punchy too, despite our best efforts to sleep on the flight. The Hertz rental car representative (who looked like actor Simon Pegg!) took great pleasure in teasing my mother, who mistakenly rented a stick shift instead of an automatic. (Drive a stick while on the wrong side of the road and the wrong side of the car? Yeah, no thanks.)
To our relief, the Simon Pegg doppelgänger found a car we could manage, and also made us laugh with an exaggerated, "Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!" Armed with cups of airport coffee and tea, we got on our way to our B&B in Donegal.
Driving in Ireland
My mother drew the short stick and was the first to try out driving on the wrong side of the road. My sister got the nail-biting role of navigator. (Faux Simon Pegg would only allow two names on the rental agreement: mine and Mom's. I wanted to cheat and let my sister drive too, but someone said we'd get into trouble.)
The trickiest part was staying off the shoulder (on the left side there) and out of the shrubbery, rocks, etc. very close to the shoulder. As the navigator, my poor sister saw that treacherous shoulder looming towards her quite often.
The drive there was long and rainy. The landscape I could see through the rain-streaked windows was very green, ranged from flat to somewhat hilly, and was dotted with sheep and brown cows.
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Lunch in Charlestown
A few hours along we stopped for a bite in the small town of Charlestown and found The Market Café, a little eatery with a homey decor of flowered tablecloths, hutches, and china. and it was here that we had our first Irish breakfast: traditionally this includes rashers, sausages, black pudding, white pudding, eggs, toast, and fried tomatoes. My sister's plate had fries instead of tomatoes.
The puddings were so interesting: two semi-circular, fried-up slices. They're made from pork and offal along with flour or oats, spices, and in the black pudding, pig's blood. I found that the white pudding tasted much like a regular breakfast sausage. The black pudding had a much stronger and distinct flavor, one that reminded me of our grandmother's old-fashioned Thanksgiving dressing made with turkey giblets.
I was nervous to try them... and surprised to find I liked them! My lunch was a more familiar panini with ham, pineapple, and Ballymaloe relish.
Rossmore Manor
We finally reached Rossmore Manor in Donegal a few hours later, after winding through a narrow lane that sat low between lush fields with grazing horses and sheep.
Perched at the top of a steep drive, Rossmore Manor is a lovely stone home designed to look like a small castle, complete with coats of arms, arched entryways, and heavy, wood doors.
The view from the drive was stunning: a sweeping view of verdant, cow-covered hills sloping down to the inlet where the River Eske empties into Donegal Bay.
What a beautiful view the owners of Rossmore wake up to every day!
Exploring Donegal Town
In Donegal Town that night we had dinner at The Harbour Restaurant. We were greeted by a crackling fire in the fireplace as we came in out of the windy, damp air.
It was there at our table that we heard our first "Not a bother!" This was our waitress's smiling answer to everything we asked for and after each of our thank-yous!
"Not a bother"—such a welcoming and friendly reply. What a wonderful world it would be to always hear and reassure others with it. Though we would occasionally hear this at other stops on our trip, to us it was really a Donegal-ism.
My sister had the Harbour's traditional Fish and Chips (served with mushy peas) and mom had the Oven-Baked Cod.
I had a really interesting and delicious entree: a Mille Feuille made with layers of flaky pastry, toasted goat's cheese, pesto, and Mediterranean veggies. The layers of goat's cheese were generous in size and melty: a nice balance with the pesto and airy pastry.
After dinner, we wandered the streets and visited shops. As dusk fell, we saw a sign for the ruins of the 15th-century Donegal Abbey and graveyard. Sounded interesting!
As we entered the graveyard to have a look, I noticed two girls (15, maybe 16 years old) in miniskirts and puffy, cool-weather jackets. One of them was leaning against the other to steady herself as she buckled the straps of her tall, clear-plastic, wedge sandals. And I thought, "Well, that's weird."
It was then I realized that the graveyard was filled with people—not with tourists, but with teens. Girls dressed to the nines and shivering in the cold drizzle. Boys with beers in hand, laughing as they smashed their emptys against the crumbling graveyard walls.
We had walked into a party... at the ruins of a 500-year-old friary and graveyard. With the kids eyeing us leerily, we decided to sight-see another time.
The next day we had a lovely breakfast of sausages and café Americano. We also had our first taste of Irish brown bread there—a rustic, whole wheat soda bread so different from the white Irish soda bread we were familiar with. It was delicious with butter and tea!
I shared with Rossmore owner Vicky our plans to take a long drive north to Fanad Lighthouse and then drive south to Galway. She frowned and replied with a worried, "Oh no, no, no, no, no." Her husband said, "Oh that's mad." (I loved it.)
Our mistake was that we took literally the appearance that all points in Ireland are at most three hours away from each other. By week's end, we learned that this estimate doesn't account for weather, traffic, our driving abilities, or sheep in the road.
Thankfully Vicky and her husband convinced us to drive to a nearby lighthouse on St. John's Point instead. Such a wise suggestion.
Saint John's Point Lighthouse
It was my turn to drive, and I confess I was really terrified. To my surprise, it was not hard to get used to. My navigator-sister would probably disagree, as she had a few tense moments while I drove. Despite my best efforts, that shoulder loomed close to her own shoulder several times. Overall I think I did okay though!
The narrow drive wound down the point, taking us to the seacoast and lighthouse.
The views there were just gorgeous: windswept green cliffs and the blue-gray sea all around, sending pounding waves to the rocky shore.
On one cliff we discovered the word EIRE (Ireland) spelled out in white stones.
Saint John's Point was one of several lookouts along the coast manned by a volunteer Coast Watching Service that worked with the Irish Defense Forces during WWII. This "EIRE" marker and dozens of others around the coast were added to guide American pilots, and many of these EIRE markers are still visible today. (They're listed here.)
Along the point, we came upon a real gem: a tiny thatched cottage where we met Cyndi Graham. She weaves wool there on an enormous loom that takes up most of the small space, creating scarves, cloaks, hats, and other apparel.
She shared that her family has lived on the point for several generations. Her husband and father help her re-thatch the roof of the cottage every few years.
I bet little has changed on the point in all those generations, except maybe the number of people driving out to see it all.
Ballyshannon
We left the point to make our way south and stopped for a break in the town of Ballyshannon. Incorporated in 1613, the town bills itself as the oldest in Ireland.
The owner of a small arts cooperative has a lot to share with us about '70s rock musician Rory Gallagher. This Ballyshannon-born guitarist influenced the likes of Brian May, The Rolling Stones, and Eric Clapton.
Ballyshannoners proudly claim Gallagher as their own. A statue of him stands in the center of town.
We had lunch at Kate's Kitchen. And there we were delighted to discover they had "chilli sauce" on the menu!
Why? Well, my mother has recipes from her Great Aunt Lizzie Reilly, including one for Chilli Sauce. I had always assumed that "chilli" was supposed to be "chili" and had simply been misspelled on the card. But here, and indeed everywhere else we went in Ireland, it was spelled "chilli".
At Kate's Kitchen, the chilli sauce was tossed with shredded chicken and piled onto a bap—a soft, white Irish roll. It was very tasty indeed.
After some tea and Americano, we said goodbye to Ballyshannon to head to our next destination: our B&B in Clifden and a day trip to the fascinating island of Inishmore.
More Ireland travel!
The Island of Inishmore, Ireland
And a recipe for Vanilla Apple pie!
Mike Tyl says
Fantastic article, great pics and wonderful looking food. You left me hungry for food and travel😃
Anonymous says
Oh Nancy....I am picturing all these places that you are mentioning! Brings back great memories!!
Nancy Mock says
Music to my ears, so glad that you enjoy my posts!
Heidi says
I loved hearing more details about your trip, Nancy!
Nancy Mock says
Thank you Heidi, it's so fun sharing them with you!
Anonymous says
The best condiment ever!! I love you both!
Nancy Mock says
Aw thanks, xoxo! It is quite good, that Chilli Sauce!