Every autumn I end up with kilos of chillies that need to go somewhere. Hot sauce gets a lot of attention online, but honestly, chili paste is more useful in the kitchen. It’s what I reach for when I’m cooking - a spoon stirred into eggs, a smear under cheese on toast, a dollop in soup.

The question is always how to keep it. Over the years I’ve settled on three methods, each with different trade-offs.

Method one: vinegar-based paste

This is the easiest and the safest. Blitz your chillies (deseeded or not, your call) with around 20% by weight white wine vinegar, 2% salt, and a clove or two of garlic. Cook gently for ten minutes, jar while hot, lid on, fridge.

Lasts about six months in the fridge. Bright, sharp, very versatile. The vinegar pushes the pH well below 4.0, which means you don’t have to worry about botulism even if you skip the cooking step.

The downside is that it tastes like vinegar. Not a deal-breaker - and for some applications (think Sichuan-style cooking, or stirring into mayo) it’s an asset. But it’s not a paste I’d eat by the spoonful.

Method two: salted paste (the Korean approach)

This is my favourite for flavour. Roughly 15% salt by weight, blended with chillies, sometimes with a bit of fish sauce or shrimp paste to deepen things. No cooking. Pack into a clean jar, leave a couple of centimetres of headspace, lid on tight, into the fridge.

Within a week the paste starts fermenting slowly. Pop the lid every few days for the first month to release CO2. After about six weeks the active bubbling stops and you’ve got something with real depth - funky, complex, salty in a way that makes everything else taste better.

Shelf life is the longest of the three methods. I’ve used salted paste at twelve months and it was better than at six. Just keep it cold and use a clean spoon every time.

The trade-off: it’s salty. You’re using it like miso or anchovy paste, not like a hot sauce. A teaspoon goes a long way.

Method three: oil-preserved paste

This is the one people get wrong. The visual is gorgeous - a jar of chili paste with a layer of golden oil on top - but oil-covered chillies are a classic botulism risk when stored at room temperature.

I do make oil paste, but with two non-negotiable rules:

1. The chillies get cooked first - properly, at a simmer in oil for at least 15 minutes
2. The finished jar lives in the fridge, not the cupboard, and gets used within three weeks

I usually use a 50/50 mix of olive oil and a neutral oil, with whole spices toasted in the oil first. Star anise, fennel seed, a bit of cinnamon. The result is closer to a Chinese chili crisp than a Western paste.

For longer storage, I freeze the cooked oil paste in small jars. Pull one out, leave it in the fridge, use within three weeks. Works well.

Which one I actually reach for

Honestly? The salted ferment, most days. The complexity is something you can’t fake with vinegar or oil. It’s also the safest of the three from a food-safety perspective once it’s properly fermented - the acidity drops naturally as lactic acid builds up.

But I keep all three going. They do different jobs. The vinegar paste is what I add to a vinaigrette. The oil paste tops noodles or scrambled eggs. The salted ferment is for cooking - braises, soups, marinades.

A note on chili choice

Not every chili makes good paste. The waxy, thin-walled types (think serrano, cayenne) blend smoother than thick-walled types like jalapeño. For colour and flavour, I usually mix two or three varieties. A lot of red ripe Aleppo-style chillies for body, some bird’s eye for heat, and a handful of habanero for that fruity high note.

If you’re starting out, just use whatever you’ve got. The method matters more than the variety. Once you’ve made paste a few times you’ll start having opinions about which chillies you want featured.

The real lesson after fifteen years of doing this: pick one method, do it well, and you’ll never run out of chili paste again. The instinct to try every preservation technique on every batch is how you end up with twenty half-finished jars in the fridge that you forget about. Keep it simple.