Red (& Yellow & Orange) Hot Chili Peppers

It’s Seeding Season!

I’m from the South. Growing up, my dad, who was originally from Alabama, would cover pretty much everything from grits to ice cream in Tabasco and/or homemade hot sauce (i.e., the peppers-in-vinegar that are on every Low Country table).

Here in Seattle, spicy foods are generally less ubiquitous than in hotter climates, where–fun fact–they used to be used as a preservative and/or to cover the taste of food that had “turned” (I always imagined the corned beef turning into a vampire after a week in the fridge…).

In most parts of the South, especially Florida, where I grew up, all you have to do is throw pepper seeds in the ground in the spring. Come back a few months later, and you’ll have a enough peppers to make a tongue twister involving Peter Piper (a peck? how many did he pick??).

Last year, in my first-ever gardening experience, I grew jalapenos, bell peppers, and purple bell peppers, but all came from store-bought starts. Given that they were in a fairly shady patch of yard in Seattle, I was surprised they did as well as they did.

They were nothing like the bushel and a peck of peppers that my cousin in Alabama posted pictures of from her prolific and massive pepper plants grown in the dog days of a Southern summer, but I also got a pretty late start for our short growing season.

Last week, I started in on Phase 1 of Operation Hot Pepper: On Sunday, March 7, I planted all the pepper seeds you see above (see the post about seed planting) — Anaheim, Ancho, Habanero, Shishito, Jalapeno, Serrano, Cayenne, and (to balance it out) Green Bell Peppers. Below is a breakdown of their potential spice heat, from heat scale from “kinda spicy” to “calling out to whatever higher power to put you out of your infernal misery after ingesting it”).

It’s worth noticing that none of these even hold a hot & spicy candle to Ghost Peppers or Carolina Reapers, which we’ll be planting next.

Can we grow hot peppers in containers and other small spaces in a yard that’s mostly in the shade, near downtown Seattle? Will be eat them and develop an incurable case of hiccups? Stay tuned and find out!

*****************************************************

Operation Hot Pepper Phase 1—UPDATE: March 20, 13 days after planting seeds in Jiffy Seed Starting Greenhouse.

I originally planted two groups of seeds. Group 1 was planted in a Jiffy Seed Starting Greenhouse with 16 peat pods that are 55mm each (below).

Seedling Group 2: 72 seedlings in 36mm peat pots.

The second group of seedlings were in smaller pods, but there were a LOT more of ’em. So far, the Jalapenos are the peppers that popped the most. They even seemed ready to move out into their own place (i.e., into a repurposed, uncovered take-out container in the kitchen).

At this point, all the seedlings with leaves have been moved to a new home by the window, and are no longer in the “greenhouse” (covered) environment.