Homemade cayenne pepper sauce is so easy to make and so delicious. Whether you have homegrown garden hot peppers or buy them from the grocery store or local farmer’s market, you can easily make your own homemade hot sauce.
About Cayenne Peppers
Cayenne chiles are long and slender red peppers. They’re a moderately hot pepper, containing 25,000 – 50,000 heat units on the Scoville scale, so they have a medium heat level. The cayenne pepper is the base of many vinegar-based hot sauces, like Frank’s Redhot, and Louisiana Hot Sauce. Aged cayenne peppers are also ground into cayenne powder and used in chili powder.
I grow a variety of hot chili peppers to use in recipes. Every year I make my pepper jelly recipe using a mix of sweet and hot peppers. I always grow scotch bonnet peppers or habanero peppers to use in recipes like jerk chicken.
And of course milder green chilies like jalapeno peppers are essential for Mexican recipes like nachos or salsa. And serrano peppers always go in my homemade harrisa paste (another delicious hot sauce).
But when I have a lot of cayenne chili peppers I love to make hot pepper sauce.
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Why you’ll love this hot sauce recipe
- Simple ingredients: Besides fresh cayenne peppers, all you need is vinegar, red onion, garlic and some paprika and salt.
- Easy: It’s so simple to make your own hot sauce. Just use a blender or food processor to blend everything together, simmer and blend again.
- Customizable: You can vary the heat level of this hot sauce recipe to your liking. If you like a less spicy sauce, it’s easy to dial down the heat, and if you love spicy food, you can turn it up.
Ingredients for Cayenne Hot Sauce.
Ingredient quantities and full instructions are in the recipe card at the bottom of this post.
- Cayenne Peppers: Use fresh peppers from the grocery store or famers market, or use your own homegrown peppers. Peppers should be bright red, firm and waxy looking. Green cayenne peppers are unripe, and although they have the same amount of heat, they are lacking in sweetness and somewhat more bitter.
- Vinegar: I’m using regular white vinegar for this cayenne pepper sauce, but you can also use apple cider vinegar, or white wine vinegar if you prefer. You can also replace a couple tablespoons of the vinegar with lime juice or lemon juice for a hit of citrus.
- Red Onion: You can use white or yellow onion instead.
- Garlic: Use fresh cloves of garlic for best results, but garlic powder can be substituted.
- Paprika: Paprika powder is dried and ground paprika peppers and it adds a nice depth of flavor to the hot sauce. Use smoked paprika powder to add a smoky element.
- Salt: Any salt is fine. Use table salt, sea salt, or kosher salt.
How to make cayenne pepper sauce
- Add all ingredients except the vinegar to a blender or food processor. Process until the mixture is finely chopped.
- Transfer the pepper mixture to a deep saucepan. Stir in the vinegar and bring to a boil over medium high heat, then reduce heat to low and allow to simmer for 20 minutes.
- Remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature. Return to the food processor and process until smooth.
- Pour the sauce into glass jars or bottles with lids. Store in the fridge.
Helpful Tips
- Safety: When handling hot chili peppers, it’s a good idea to wear latex gloves or rubber gloves to avoid burning your skin. Be careful not to touch your face, especially your eyes. Wash your hands, and surfaces thoroughly.
- Make it hotter: If you like a spicy sauce, you can increase the heat level by leaving all the membrane and seeds (which is where most of the heat comes from). Or, by adding a very hot pepper like a habanero, scotch bonnet pepper, or even, if you’re very brave, a ghost pepper. Just be sure to add it in small amounts and taste after each addition.
- Make it less hot: We think this sauce has just the right amount of heat. However, everyone’s taste buds are different, and you might like less spice. Remove all or some of the seeds and membrane from the cayenne peppers to reduce the heat level. Or try substituting one or more of the cayennes for a milder pepper like a jalapeno.
- Consistency: If you like a thicker or thinner hot sauce, its easy to achieve your desired consistency. Strain your cayenne sauce though a fine sieve or fine mesh strainer for a thinner sauce, or add more vinegar. If you do strain the sauce, you will end up with a smaller yield.
- Yield: This recipe should yield approximately 8 fl oz. This is an estimate and you could end up with more or less cayenne sauce.
- Storage: Store your hot sauce, tightly capped, in a glass jar in the fridge. The vinegar, salt, and the capsicum in the peppers help to protect the sauce from bacteria. Your cayenne pepper sauce should keep for months, or more. To be safe, use a kitchen PH meter. The PH of your hot sauce should be less than 4.6.
How to use your homemade hot sauce
You can use this cayenne hot sauce to make buffalo chicken, buffalo cauliflower or anywhere you would use Frank’s Redhot original cayenne pepper sauce.
We love it on chicken wings, and its great with eggs, too, especially my baked huevos rancheros. Cayenne pepper sauce is delicious drizzled on tacos, burrito bowls, burgers, and hot dogs.
Try mixing hot sauce and mayonnaise to make a delicious dipping sauce for fries, zucchini fritters, or my baked green tomatoes. And I love to add a drizzle to soups like sweet potato black bean soup, or southwestern pumpkin soup.
Frequently Asked Questions
This isn’t a canning recipe, but you can go through the canning process by using a boiling water bath.
Yes, you can use tobasco peppers, which have a similar heat level, or red jalapenos for a slightly milder heat.
This cayenne pepper sauce recipe is an unfermented hot sauce. It’s quick and ready right away, unlike fermented hot sauce recipes which can take a week or more to ferment. Unfermented hot sauce tend to be milder than fermented sauces, and both are delicious.
Did you make this recipe? Please leave a rating in the comments below and let us know how it turned out. Did you make any changes? We would love for you to share and your feedback is important! Thank you for visiting The Food Blog!
Recipe
Cayenne Pepper Sauce
Make your own homemade cayenne pepper sauce with fresh chili peppers! It’s easy and you control the heat level and sodium. Homemade hot sauce is a great way to use up those garden peppers.
Prevent your screen from going dark
Servings: 32 tablespoons
Calories: 4kcal
Instructions
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Add all ingredients except the vinegar to a blender or food processor. Process until the mixture is finely chopped.
6 oz fresh cayenne peppers, ¼ red onion, 4 garlic cloves, 1 teaspoon paprika, 1 teaspoon salt
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Transfer the pepper mixture to a deep saucepan. Add the vinegar and bring to a boil over medium high heat, then reduce heat to low and allow to simmer for 20 minutes.
1 cup white vinegar
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Remove from heat and allow the mixture to cool to room temperature. Return it to the food processor and process until smooth.
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Pour the sauce into glass jars or bottles with lids. Store in the fridge.
Notes
- Safety: When handling hot chili peppers, it’s a good idea to wear latex gloves or rubber gloves to avoid burning your skin. Be careful not to touch your face, especially your eyes.
- Make it hotter: If you like a spicy sauce, you can increase the heat level by leaving all the membrane and seeds (which is where most of the heat comes from). Or, by adding a very hot pepper like a habanero, scotch bonnet pepper, or even, if you’re very brave, a ghost pepper. Just be sure to add it in small amounts and taste after each addition.
- Make it less hot: Remove all or some of the seeds and membrane from the cayenne peppers to reduce the heat level. Or try substituting one or more of the cayennes for a milder pepper like a jalapeno.
- Consistency: If you like a thicker or thinner hot sauce, its easy to achieve your desired consistency. Strain your hot sauce though a fine sieve for a thinner sauce, or add more vinegar.
- Yield: This recipe should yield approximately 8 fl oz. This is an estimate and you could end up with more or less cayenne sauce.
- Storage: Store your hot sauce, tightly capped, in a glass jar in the fridge. The vinegar, salt, and the capsicum in the peppers help to protect the sauce from bacteria. Your cayenne pepper sauce should keep for months, or more. To be safe, use a kitchen PH meter. The PH of your hot sauce should be less than 4.6.
Nutrition
Calories: 4kcal | Carbohydrates: 1g | Protein: 0.1g | Fat: 0.03g | Saturated Fat: 0.004g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.02g | Monounsaturated Fat: 0.002g | Sodium: 73mg | Potassium: 20mg | Fiber: 0.1g | Sugar: 0.3g | Vitamin A: 81IU | Vitamin C: 8mg | Calcium: 2mg | Iron: 0.1mg
Colleen
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