Make your own Chili Schnapps

Recipe for making your own spicy Chili Schnapps

You will need a bottle of schnapps of your choice. We recommend the following: Vodka, corn, fruit schnapps, marc (Grappa). Alternatively you can use a liquor of your choice. Chili goes very well with the sweetness of liquor.

Next comes the hard part: choosing the right type of chili. Using any old fresh chilli from the supermarket can give the liquor an unpleasant taste. Unripe chillies should never be used, as these taste bitter. The best chillies to use for making Schnapps are the following very flavourful and fruity, non-bitter varieties: Habanero, Bhut Jolokia, Trinidad Scorpion, Fatalii. Unfortunately, except for the Habanero, hardly any of them can be acquired commercially. However, you can cultivate your own.

Wash the chillies thoroughly in cold water and cut them lengthwise with a knife. The seeds and the white placenta should be removed, since these contain most of the spiciness, but none of the taste. The seeds would also look unsightly in the bottle. Now put the chili pieces, depending on your desired level of spiciness, into the bottle and leave them for a few days before the first test. If you don’t like it too hot, you should only use a very small piece of the spicy chili. A very spicy mix would be 2 Habaneros per bottle. As long as the Schnapps contains at least 40% alcohol, you won’t need to worry about the storage life. The alcohol preserves the chillies. Over time the chillies lose their colour, this is completely normal.

Have fun experimenting.