Favorite Chili Pepper

[AMKuska]

Hey everyone, I'm looking for a good mild chili pepper to grow for canning diced tomatoes and chilis. We buy so many from the store, and it seems silly to buy something I know I can grow myself. The problem is my tongue does not love being burnt to a crisp, and many of the peppers I grow are for my husband. <-- my mouth looks like this after a Habanero, to say nothing of the spicier ones!

 

[digitS']

Spicier than a Habanero? Cheese Louise!

I will be interested in the responses. With most hot peppers (jalapeños excepted) I feel very limited by what will ripen. Do you think that your cool, maritime location will make that a problem for you, AMK? Maybe not, if Habaneros have done okay for you.

Thai Hot and Super Chili ripen but their heat rating must be just on this side of wild!

Steve

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Well, for mild heat, the classic is the Poblano (big pepper also the one they smoke to make ancho chilis).

If even THAT is too spicy, try something in the Pepperoncini group those have just a little nip. Those Amazonian muskmelon shaped peppers I grew last year (which aren't really all that muskmelon shaped) are about that level of heat, maybe a 10-25 on the Scoville scale.

 

[AMKuska]

@digitS' I have a whole system for getting peppers to grow here. All of my peppers are started in the grow tent very early, and they aren't put out until just before they flower. They are carefully mulched and fertilized, and I try to aim it so they aren't put out until mid to late may, well after frost and the soil has warmed.

I'll do a thread on my peppers next season. This year they were a bust due to soil issues, but last year I had pepper plants that were 3 feet tall and quite bushy.

 

[AMKuska]

Oooh, I forgot about poblanos. I don't recall them being spicy. I'll definitely grow those!

 

[flowerbug]

i've had some sauces made with a pepper called Aji or Ajai, but i can't recall the exact name but to me that sauce was just the right amount of heat.

the other approach you could take to this would be to grow some hotter ones and then do a very fine dice or cook them up and put them in the blender and just add what you need to get to the right amount of heat along with some other regular red roasted bell peppers. i've used this approach to get some very mild chili that Mom could even eat that had good pepper flavor from the roasted red peppers. then a few years later Mom decided she didn't like red peppers either so... *shrug* people are funny... (she won't eat green peppers now either).

 

[ninnymary]

One of my favorite peppers are shi shi to. They are mild but occasionally you may get a hot one. I love to blister them in a cast iron pan with a little olive oil, salt and pepper, then finish with a squirt of lemon juice. My son makes an avocado creme to dip them in but it's not necessary.

My son (who is a chef) and always requests that I plant a couple things for him just got me 3 packages of seeds. One of them is Habanada. It has the flavor of a habanero but without the heat. I can't wait to plant it next year.

Another seed package that he gave me is Beauregarde a purple snow pea. They are supposed to retain their purple vibrant color even after cooking. I'm excited for this one also.

Mary

 

[Zeedman]

"Aji" (usually followed by another word) refers to several chili peppers of various colors & heat scales. I grow one of those, Aji Cristal, which is a very productive pepper of medium heat. Aji Dulce is basically a Habanero without heat, but thin walled & not very productive, so I wouldn't recommend it.

How much heat do you want? What type of growing season do you have, in terms of DTM? Will it be used green, or ripe? And does it matter if the peppers are thin-walled or thick-walled? A lot of questions I know, but it will help to narrow down the choices.

I would second @Pulsegleaner 's recommendation for Poblano, if your season is long enough. As a frame of reference, it matures very late here (my growing season is 130-140 days).

A few other varieties I could recommend:
- Beaver Dam. Heavy, thick-walled conical peppers 5-6" L X 2.5" W at the shoulder, 4-6 oz.. The plants are very productive, and will lodge under the weight of the peppers; so they need some support once the peppers become large. 70-80 DTM for red ripe. Moderately low heat.
- Bea. Long conical peppers, 5-6" L X 1.25" W, about 1 oz., medium-thick walls, white/yellow immature, changing to orange, then red when ripe. Very heavy set, so plants need support. I didn't record my DTM, but nearly all peppers matured. I am growing it this year, but they are not yet ripe - will try to post a photo.
- Italian Cheese. Round, heavily-ruffled peppers, up to 3" W X 2" H, moderately thick walls, 2-4 oz., red when ripe (I posted a photo in the "what did you do in the garden" thread). Tall plants that need support when peppers enlarge, short DTM. Moderate heat.
- Pelso. Conical peppers borne erect, 3.5-4" L X 2" at shoulder, thick walled, turning cream/yellow... orange... red ripe, Dwarf plants with a surprisingly heavy set, DTM 90 days. (when dried, this is my favorite pepper for paprika powder.)

Regardless of which variety you grow, you do have some control over heat. Most of the heat in a pepper is located in the seeds & placenta; so if you remove those completely, the heat can be greatly reduced. When I remove all the placenta from Beaver Dam, it makes a canned salsa with just a hint of heat.

Keep pepper plants watered, peppers often increase in heat under dry conditions. Peppers also tend to be hotter when harvested in warm/hot conditions, IMO the heat is less when harvested in cool conditions - sometimes much less. I plant a hot pepper (Pizza) to take advantage of that, it becomes nearly sweet when harvested just before frost (I will be picking them soon).

 

[Zeedman]

Another seed package that he gave me is Beauregarde a purple snow pea. They are supposed to retain their purple vibrant color even after cooking. I'm excited for this one also.

Well that looks interesting... something to add to next year's grow list.

 

[digitS']

A few other varieties I could recommend:
- Beaver Dam. Heavy, thick-walled conical peppers 5-6" L X 2.5" W at the shoulder, 4-6 oz.. The plants are very productive, and will lodge under the weight of the peppers; so they need some support once the peppers become large. 70-80 DTM for red ripe. Moderately low heat

"Beaver Dam Pepper worked wonderfully for us this summer in our garden’s 5,000' elevation in sandy loam with 5% humidity. Heirloom" So reports grower on Fedco Seed

This looks like a good choice for me. I will hope that it is a little spicier than Anaheim. It's not that I don't appreciate the Anaheim peppers that I have grown for years. It's that I didn't even know that it was considered a hot for the first few of those years.

Steve