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I'm back for the 2018/2019 season in a new rental with slightly better backyard for chilli growing  :hot:   This season I have:   a few overwinters that were started as late seedlings (Naga Viper, Trinidad Scorpion Butch T, Serrano, Jalapeno) a couple of more advanced plants as 1 year...

I couldn't resist buying a chilli seedling from the local hardware chain store.  Not clear labelling, but it looks like it's supposed to be a Naga Bhut Jolokia of some sort:       I also discovered the wonders of kefir this week, and I'm fermenting my second batch in the photo below:  

Can't edit my post above, so I'll add here...     Just tested the chilli sauce and it has pH of 4.0 on my cheapo meter.   The kim-chi has spent 4 days fermenting on the kitchen bench, so I'll move that back into the fridge and taste test tonight.

Cooked up another batch of the fermented chilli sauce.  This time the Yellow 7 pot and red capsicum sauce started from June 4.  I used the finest mesh on the mouli thingy and added a couple of jars of water to help dilute.  This time I ended up with 10 x 250ml bottles and half a jar for the...

While the Melbourne Spring is playing up outside (just had a hail storm), I made up some kim chi using a simple recipe:   - 1 Chinese cabbage soaked in 1 cup of salt and 1 cup of water for an hour then washed and drained - 1 cup of korean chilli flakes - 6 cloves of garlic coarsely chopped -...

Just ran a pH test on the sauce with two cheapo calibrated digital meters.  Red meter: 3.86.  Yellow meter: 4.0.

How do I prepare a sample my chilli sauce to measure with a digital meter?  Should I use the pure sauce or dilute with distilled water?

Finally got around to bottling some of the fermented sauce.  This was from the very first mash I made in July and I ended up with 9 x 250ml bottles of the 7pot and carrot recipe.  Next time I'll make sure to use the fine mesh on the mouli thingy, because after using the middle mesh and stick...

    Thanks, Rael.  I haven't put in any seeds for many years... I'm too lazy to do that these days, especially so when Master's Hardware were selling all the super hot chillies you see in my grow for $5 each :)   Ocean Grove sounds alright.  Hopefully the ocean breeze will help out the chillies...

Spring time has arrived here in Melbourne and I've moved to a new property.  Not ideal for chilli growing, but whatever... first photo of the season shows 4 of last season's overwinters, each in a 15 gallon pot, a 7 pot yellow, 7 pot pink, naga jolokia red, jay's red:    

Just wrapped up the season.  Very long by Melbourne standards.  Usually my chillies would be dead sticks if I left them out till now.   I've moved all the plants I want to keep into 20cm pots for overwintering and given them a good drenching in seaweed concentrate (hope that helps):     Last...

Another couple of batches of pepper mash.  Recipes as follows:   Batch 1: - 250g yellow pot 7 - approx 1kg red capsicum - approx 1kg brown onions - approx 100g garlic - 250mL water - 150g iodised salt   Batch 2: - 500g Jay's Red - approx 1kg papaya - approx 1kg brown onions - approx 100g garlic...

Not for the Faint of Mouth: Why Garlic Packs Such a Wallop: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/16/science/not-for-the-faint-of-mouth-why-garlic-packs-such-a-wallop.html" rel='nofollow external'...

    I'm looking forward to the results in a month or so :)   The mason jars aren't on too tightly, so I think they'll be ok.  The large jar has a rubber gasket that I think will let co2 out, otherwise I'll occasionally burp it.

Last harvest from the red naga bhut jolokia's for the season: 1kg early Winter harvest of a combination of ripe red and not quite ripe orange colored pods.   Also decided to make another hot sauce with the 1kg red naga bhut jolokias:   - 1kg red naga bhut jolokia - approx 1kg carrots - approx...

After reading over smokenfire's fermented sauce recipe, I decided to make some fermented hot sauce today with a kilo of the yellow 7 pots.  All ingredients were roughly chopped then run through a cheapo blender.  Anyone care to run over the below recipes and let me know if I'm likely to die from...

Plants are still pumping out pods... ridiculously long season by normal standards.  I'll try and collect the remaining pods over the next couple of weeks when I get time and overwinter the best plants.    After reading over smokenfire's fermented sauce recipe, I decided to make some fermented...