Homemade EASY Harissa Paste
For those not familiar with harissa, it’s a Middle Eastern paste made with peppers and chilli’s. A jar of harissa is such a workhorse in my fridge and I am very happy to add a spoonful of harissa’s spicy deliciousness to most of my dishes.
Ways to use harissa:
- added to a dressing to add a Middle Eastern vibe
- added to a marinade to coat veggies or meat
- added to a soup either in the cooking process or swirled through in the end
- swirled through yogurt to add flavour
More harissa recipes:
- Harissa White Bean Stew with Preserved Lemon
- Spicy Quinoa Salad with Jalapeño Dressing & Toasted Seeds
- Autumn Pumpkin Traybake with Harissa Chickpeas & Easy Dukkah
- Sweet Potato Fries with Harissa Tahini Dip
As with most shop-bought items, the quality and flavour can vary immensely with some harissa pastes being too spicy.
Making your own harissa paste at home can be daunting, and if you are a ‘purist’ like me, finding the right ingredients, specifically the correct dried chilli’s can be difficult.
SO, I created a very DO-ABLE recipe that most of us can make in our kitchen using everyday ingredients. The recipe is totally adaptable towards your ‘chilli’ taste and you can even leave it out completely, although, I would urge you to keep a little bit of chilli in.
Purist look away, the recipe is not authentic at all but, it packs a flavour punch, it’s easy to make and costs half the price of a shop-bought jar!
A note on chilli:
There are a few chilli options here, I prefer to add a smoked dried chilli in my harissa, they are now easy to find online and in good deli’s. I love the El Burro Mercado brand and you can find a list of their stockist here. In Cape Town, Olive Branch Deli has an excellent dried chilli section!
Homemade EASY Harissa Paste
Equipment
- NutriBullet (or food processor)
Ingredients
- 2 large red pepper halved, white membrane and seeds removed
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 4 dried smoked chillies see recipe intro (opt)
- 1 teaspoon Spanish smoked sweet paprika
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon ground coriander
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 cup good extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/2 lemon to squeeze (according to your taste)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to full grill - at least 10 minutes before the cooking, add a tray to the oven.
- Put the chillies in a bowl of lukewarm water and place a small plate on top to keep them submerged. Leave to soak until soft and fully rehydrated (this can take as long as 15-30 minutes, depending on the size). Drain and remove any hard stalks, roughly chopped if using large chillies.
- Carefully remove the tray and add the peppers cut side down to the tray, pop back into the oven and keep an eye on them, you want the peppers to definitely 'char' a bit but not burn, depending on your oven, this might take about 15-20 minutes. Remove from the oven and set aside.
- While the peppers are grilling, add the coriander, cumin and paprika to a small frying pan (no oil) and heat until the spices are fragrant, set aside.
- Add all the ingredients to the food processor and blitz until smooth - taste and adjust the seasoning by adding more salt and lemon if you prefer. Add to a jar, layer with olive oil to cover the top, and keep in the fridge. You can also pop a jar in the freezer. Enjoy!