My friend Jenn from Bread + Butter put out a call to her Food Blogging friends to participate in a “Blogger Secret Ingredient” Challenge. Everyone had until today to post a recipe using bell peppers. Like the slacker I am I waited until today to make my recipe. But I must say, just because I waited until the last minute doesn’t mean my entry is sad or pathetic. Quite the opposite if I do say so myself. What I present to you and Jenn is a recipe (the winning recipe ;)) for “Red Bell Pepper Relish”.
It was very easy to make and fabulous to eat to say the least. I plan on buying some cute canning jars and making a big batch of this relish and give them away as gifts. This sweet and savory relish would be great poured on brie, cream cheese, or straight up served with crackers. Or in my case, pretzels. The addition of red pepper flakes gives this relish a nice little tingly heat burn on the tongue that is not too hot but enough to tantalize your tastebuds. This is so much better than anything you can buy in the store. Enjoy!
Red Bell Pepper Relish Recipe
(yields 3/4 cup of relish)
Ingredients:
1 red bell pepper (or any other type of bell pepper), chopped in small pieces
1/2 onion, chopped in small pieces
2/3 cup of sugar
1/2 cup of white vinegar
1/2 tsp of red pepper flakes (if you like less heat, use 1/4 tsp. If you like more heat, add 1/4 tsp.)
Directions:
Add everything to a small sauce pan and stir all the ingredients until well incorporated. Cook the relish on medium heat for 5 minutes and turn down the heat to medium-low for an additional 20 minutes, stirring occasionally until most of the liquid has reduced. Remove from heat and allow to cool before serving.
A local fish restaurant keeps a jar of this on each table. They serve a “set-up” of white beans, cole slaw, and hush puppies. The relish goes with the beans. We have a friend from out of town who loves to eat there. I think his main reason is for the beans and relish . He commented that it needed a little heat, and when I searched online for a recipe that I could add heat to, I was tickled that your recipe came up first and that yours had heat. Thanks a bunch. I will be making this soon.
Because of the sugar and vinegar, water bath is fine. Check the Ball Bluebook site for directions. Probably 2o minutes.
I made this and loved it. I added a small serano pepper to kick up the heat too. Kept seeing red pepper relish on the cooking shows and I’m glad this the recipe I went with 🙂
I am just stumbling upon this blog. I was wondering, you mentioned canning this. Would you need to pressure can it or can it be water bath canned?
I just made this…. It took about 55 min to get the liquid evaporated…. Looks just like the picture and tastes great. So we will see tomorrow after it cools how it is.
I cooked it on Med Low most of the time. 🙂
I am in the process of making this now. Everything is going the way it should but it is taking a lot longer to cook down. I am using a small sauce pan and it has now been cooking a total of 55min. Almost done though, and Taste’s Great.
Hi Diane,
Sorry to hear about the relish becoming to stiff. When I store this in the fridge it is somewhat hard but what I like to do is microwave it in 30 second intervals until it softens up.
I made a double batch to pair with cream cheese. The tast-testing along the way promised great results; I love making tasty food from scratch. Unfortunately, got a late start and it was 2 am before it was done. Pulled it out of the fridge the next day, only to find it hard and unworkable. Got it to room temp, and no change. Ughhhhhhh. It had such promise! Not sure what went wrong. Had to go with the store bought stuff afterall.
I SO need to make this! Looks absolutely delicious.
OK-today I made red pepper relish. I had 2 1/2 red peppers and used them in combination with all stated ingredients/amounts. I am pleased to say that the recipe turned out as expected.For those desiring to make alot at once-I am not sure you can expect to get the consistency of relish–see my previous comment. Good Luck!
I thought I could make mass quantities of the “relish’;however what I ended up with was pepper jam. I made 7 times the recipe;used both red and green peppers. Total time to cook was around 4 hours. The color is copper;the taste is pure happiness. I am not disappointed in what I got in the end.
This is a wonderful, sophisticated use of sweet, delicious red bell peppers! Question though… Would I ruin the end product if I pureed the onion in the vinegar first, then cooked as directed? I’m not a fan of onion, especially when in chunks. 🙁
Made it this weekend. Had family over for holidays and had a slider bar. This was one of the toppings. It was redonculous. Seriously – it was fantastic. And when you add it with something that has heat like pickled jalapenos. OH MY. Best burger I ever had – cheeduh cheese, red pepper relish, pickled jalapenos, cream cheese, lettuce, tomato. It was burgasmic.
This looks phenomenal! I have made red pepper relishes in the past and have ended up with tons of leftovers. I have used it on cream cheese and lamb burgers but do you have any other suggestions of how to use? I will definitely try this recipe next time!
Thank you for this wonderful recipe. I just made a double batch and it turned out WONDERFUL!! Mine was a little juicier than yours, so I had to simmer it about 15 minutes longer. The end result looks exactly like yours and it is SO Delicious!
I tried this wonderful looking relish, too, but not with much luck. I’m curious – you say one bell pepper and half an onion. As these come in multitudes of sizes, could you be more specific? 1 cup chopped bell pepper, 1/2 cup onion? After cooking on med low for 25 minutes, the liquid had not reduced at all. I turned it up a bit and it has finally reduced but doesn’t look anything like yours. Tears!
This is DELICIOUS & sooo easy! Thank you!
Alice, thanks for bringing our attention to this beautiful relish on twitter today. Love the idea of it poured over warm brie 🙂
Oh wow, that looks fantastic! So thick and rich–I can imagine it on all sorts of things. Just beautiful.
I made this for my bookclub. I absoluately ADORED it. So did everyone else. I hoping some would be left over–not! I was practically licking the bowl out at the end of the night. I did use two smallish pepper and reduced the sugar just slightly. I served poured over cream cheese to put on crackers. This will be a new staple for appetizers. LOVE IT!! Don’t know what the others did wrong–incredibly easy!
Hi Chantelle,
No, its not suppose to bubble hard for a long period of time.. and should definitely not caramelize. I suggest you reduce your cooking time by 5-10 minutes and see if that helps.
Umm is it suppose to bubble hard core for a while? On top of that mine didn’t work turned into a chunk of caramel with peppers and onions inside! are you sure you don’t have to let it stand for a bit all the other recipe’s i’ve found for this take like 4 hours to make.
Rob: I’m not sure what went wrong. Are you preparing this on high heat? I would reduce your heat because it shouldn’t be caramelizing. You may need to stir more often. It is a similar process as making jam. The sugar acts as a preservative and therefore you need it. Feel free to email me with what you’re doing so I can help you further.
Alice
I tried this three times and each time I ended up with the sugar turning to caramel before all the liquid was evaporated. What am I doing wrong? seems like a lot of sugar for 1 bell pepper?