Anyone Successfully Use Blender Technique to Harvest Seeds?

[hottoddy]

After hand harvesting thousands of seeds this season, I'm thinking about trying the blender method. I've read a few web tutorials on the process and it seems like you risk blending the seeds. At best it seems very touchy, and hot peppers with water can be more fumy than making hot sauce. I may try it on some jalapenos and see how it goes. Does anyone prefer doing it this way and care to share tips? If not, I'd love to hear if people have more efficient techniques than my knife, tweezers, paper plate method. 

 

[JoynersHotPeppers]

I use this for my stuff.
 

 

[hottoddy]

Sweet but we all can't be Captain's of Industry! Do they make a smaller hand-crank version for us simple folk?

 

[queequeg152]

I use this for my stuff.

seriously? thats cool as hell. any videos of it in action... or what have you?

 

[JoynersHotPeppers]

It is a joke, I think that damn thing is 10k! I really could use it for the millions of Thai seeds however  

 

[Justaguy]

Nitrile gloves and a knife. Halve the pod and use my thumbs to slide them out. I may miss two or three seeds but I get through them quick and any placenta is easily removed once dry. I like to take the placenta I remove and toss them on sandwiches yumm

 

[JoynersHotPeppers]

Nitrile gloves and a knife. Halve the pod and use my thumbs to slide them out. I may miss two or three seeds but I get through them quick and any placenta is easily removed once dry. I like to take the placenta I remove and toss them on sandwiches yumm

Works great on pods with size but 10's of thousand Thai pods....not so much  
 
 
To answer the original question, my blender would make a seed smoothie so I have never tried it.  

 

[hottoddy]

Yeah, that's pretty much how I do it. Talk about monotonous! I'd still to experiment with the blender method. It probably just takes a few quick pulses - otherwise even a simple blender would puree those seeds.

 

[Justaguy]

If you have an old base or pick up a second one($8 is what I paid for my spare base on my oster for powders) you could possibly grind the blades dull to beat the seeds out.

 

[RedtailForester]

I've only had luck with the blender technique on seeds that have a thick coating like chiltepin. I wait until they are dry and then throw them in. Luckily, I have a small blender that has a "grind" setting on it. It uses the back of the blade so it doesn't slice them all up.

 

[Gotrox]

I like to play with my pods.
 
But for personal stash, I usually mark a few pods for seed, and let them dry on the vine---as it were.

 

[Jeff H]

 
 
 
To answer the original question, my blender would make a seed smoothie so I have never tried it.  

 
Yep, mine does too, but it leaves the smoothy gritty since it pulverizes the seeds to fine sand but can't make them disappear and surely can't keep them in tact. <--Kitchen Aid blender. Ninja might do better.

 

[SavinaRed]

Nitrile gloves and a knife. Halve the pod and use my thumbs to slide them out. I may miss two or three seeds but I get through them quick and any placenta is easily removed once dry. I like to take the placenta I remove and toss them on sandwiches yumm

Thats how I retrieve my seeds.

 

[SL3]

Put my precious seeds in a blender? Never! 

 

[midwestchilehead]

I have used a blender with a wet method. I've heard that if you cover the blades with small rubber tubes, the blender won't slice up the pods/seeds as bad, but have never tried that. Usually just a couple pulses is sufficient to dislodge the seeds from the halved pods. The only thing I don't like about this method is all the seeds you lose when pouring/skimming off the chopped vegetation, but the method works well, especially for the smaller varieties like Tobasco, Chiltepin and the smaller ornamentals.