Comptine's Swedish Glog 2016

stickman · Aug 15, 2016

Comptine said:
That sounded like quite an interesting sauce, I can't even imagine what it'd taste like, but I like all those ingredients, so it should be good, right?

I think a seed swap would be an excellent idea. The gochus sure peaked my curiosity, rare (in this part of the world) peppers tend to do that.

Right, I'm calling it, this is not a purple pequin at all, not even a cross I reckon. That red mature one didn't go through a purple phase at all, not to mention that they are too big. I'm not growing anything like this pepper, so it shouldn't be a mix up on my front.

Definitely not on your end, but your "Pequin" could be a cross. Gary (Windchicken) has 5 different varieties, and he says that they readily cross-pollinate. A friend of mine recently went to New Mexico and brought back a bag of what were labeled as Pequins that look an awful lot like your pic. I'm pretty sure they're a Pequin-Anaheim cross.

Glad you're up for a seed swap. I'll pm when I get them ready for shipment and we can go from there.

The smoked Hab-Blueberry sauce did come out very tasty. I sold the remaining half a case to a neighbor who said it was the best hot sauce he'd ever tried. I know where to get more Chocolate Habs locally (since I didn't grow them this year) and I guess it's time to make another case. Cheers!

Comptine · Aug 22, 2016

Quickie photo update. I was tying up my Rio Huallaga (I think) Rocoto, just to keep the fruit and branches off the ground. I snapped a few pictures of it. It has a decent amount of good sized fruit on it. I think I'd like to make a rocoto sauce now actually. I've had quite a few Aji Oros come in that I might freeze for now.

And the Locato red has some nice fat fruits on it too.

The Rocoto Mini is taking it's time maturing.

Poor picture, but my tabascos almost look more like the purple piquins than the purple piquins do. It'll be quite annoying if I mislabeled this one. What do you experts reckon? In the purple sunburn or are they not, in fact, tabascos?

This is a work in progress still.

And a mini haul I had the other day for a chili jam.

Brocoli · Aug 22, 2016

From that pic, the purple is not sunburn, IMO. As it looks to start from the top of the pod and works its way down (up in this case?)

Could be a cool purple tobasco cross, I dont have any experience with Pequins yet. Give 'er a chomp and tell us what ya got :onfire:

tsurrie · Aug 22, 2016

That Rocotos are looking loaded. They seem to work very well for you. I'm doing something wrong, because they just grow and seem not to produce any good pods. It's just the one at my father's in law that has a few bigger pods on. Off course...the white flies are not helping... they seem to love them leaves for some reason. Damn little buggers it's hard to get rid of them.

stickman · Aug 22, 2016

Comptine said:
Poor picture, but my tabascos almost look more like the purple piquins than the purple piquins do. It'll be quite annoying if I mislabeled this one. What do you experts reckon? In the purple sunburn or are they not, in fact, tabascos?

This is a work in progress still.

I think the Pubiscens varieties you're growing like your cooler temperatures Alana, you've got some great pod-set going!

The pods of both the Tabasco and Pequin are very similar in their upright habit, soft and pulpy flesh and tendency to fall off the stem when ripe. The growth habit of the plant looks more like Pequin to me though.... In my experience the pods seem to get laid down in tiers on the Tabasco and they seem to be more evenly distributed on the Pequin.

Do you have any problem with mold inside your pods when you air dry them Alana? We have fairly high humidity here, and I lose about 30% of any pods I air-dry to mold. That's why I built my solar dehydrator.

Cheers!

Comptine · Aug 23, 2016

Brocoli said:
From that pic, the purple is not sunburn, IMO. As it looks to start from the top of the pod and works its way down (up in this case?)

Could be a cool purple tobasco cross, I dont have any experience with Pequins yet. Give 'er a chomp and tell us what ya got

I feared that to be honest. Most of them seem to turn purple, despite being hidden in the canopy. I've never had a fresh tabasco fruit so I would not be able to tell if it's even a cros with a tabasco.

tsurrie said:
That Rocotos are looking loaded. They seem to work very well for you. I'm doing something wrong, because they just grow and seem not to produce any good pods. It's just the one at my father's in law that has a few bigger pods on. Off course...the white flies are not helping... they seem to love them leaves for some reason. Damn little buggers it's hard to get rid of them.

Cheers, yeah, surprisingly they've done really well in my climate. Turns out I also like the taste of them, so I might look into growing more next year. It was a bit of a gamble, I read that they could be difficult to grow. Hmm, I've treated these exactly the same as all my peppers, maybe it just comes down to the climate?

stickman said:
I think the Pubiscens varieties you're growing like your cooler temperatures Alana, you've got some great pod-set going!

The pods of both the Tabasco and Pequin are very similar in their upright habit, soft and pulpy flesh and tendency to fall off the stem when ripe. The growth habit of the plant looks more like Pequin to me though.... In my experience the pods seem to get laid down in tiers on the Tabasco and they seem to be more evenly distributed on the Pequin.

Do you have any problem with mold inside your pods when you air dry them Alana? We have fairly high humidity here, and I lose about 30% of any pods I air-dry to mold. That's why I built my solar dehydrator.

Cheers!

Cheers Rick, they do indeed seem to like our climate. I seem to do well with annums too, they aren't particularly fussy plants.

I don't think we tend to have a particularly humid climate where I live, which is sort of inland. Sure, there's a lake not too far off, but it's not enough to make it humid. Neither does it get warm enough for the water to evaporate into the air. I've not had any issues with mold, and everything I put up to dry tends to dry pretty fast. Your solar dehydrator looks wicked though! Was it last year you built it? I feel like I followed the thread where you documented the build, but I can't remember when that was. I'm guessing though that when you have so much produce as you do you need an effective way of drying fruit fast, and in large quantities.

karoo · Aug 24, 2016

Like the ristra .
That is next on my to do list for this coming season.

Quite a few classics on the bookshelf . :cool:

Trident chilli · Aug 27, 2016

Alana all looking well especially your pubiscens ... you mentioned that you liked the taste which is your favourite so far ... also like the ristra

stickman · Aug 28, 2016

Comptine said:
Cheers Rick, they do indeed seem to like our climate. I seem to do well with annums too, they aren't particularly fussy plants.

Agreed...

I don't think we tend to have a particularly humid climate where I live, which is sort of inland. Sure, there's a lake not too far off, but it's not enough to make it humid. Neither does it get warm enough for the water to evaporate into the air. I've not had any issues with mold, and everything I put up to dry tends to dry pretty fast. Your solar dehydrator looks wicked though! Was it last year you built it? I feel like I followed the thread where you documented the build, but I can't remember when that was. I'm guessing though that when you have so much produce as you do you need an effective way of drying fruit fast, and in large quantities.

Yup, I built it around the end of August last year... just in time to dry my chile crop. http://www.motherearthnews.com/diy/tools/solar-food-dehydrator-plans-zm0z14jjzmar.aspx

Comptine · Aug 29, 2016

karoo said:
Like the ristra .
That is next on my to do list for this coming season.

Quite a few classics on the bookshelf .

The ristra is quite easy to make with these smaller peppers. I literally just use a needle and thread and just add more on as they mature.

Trident chilli said:
Alana all looking well especially your pubiscens ... you mentioned that you liked the taste which is your favourite so far ... also like the ristra

I've only really tried the Aji Oro so far, but I was blown away by it. If they're all like that I might be hooked on pubes.

stickman said:
Yup, I built it around the end of August last year... just in time to dry my chile crop. http://www.motherearthnews.com/diy/tools/solar-food-dehydrator-plans-zm0z14jjzmar.aspx

That's a good tutorial. Did you ever have one of those electric dehydrators before that? How much more are you able to process with this one?

stickman · Aug 29, 2016

Comptine said:
I've only really tried the Aji Oro so far, but I was blown away by it. If they're all like that I might be hooked on pubes.

That's a good tutorial. Did you ever have one of those electric dehydrators before that? How much more are you able to process with this one?

They're as hot as any Habanero, but if you tried Orange Manzanos, I think you'd like them too.

I do have an electric food dryer with 4 trays. Each of the trays is about one and a half square feet in area. The solar dehydrator has eleven trays of about 2 square feet in area, so it has more than double the capacity and uses none of the electricity.

Comptine · Aug 31, 2016

Super quickie harvest post.

I'm getting lots of Aji Oro, I think I've harvested nearly 10 more since taking this picture. I'm cutting them in half and popping them in the freezer, along with the Aji Lemon/Pineapple to make a sauce later on. I am extremely pleased with the size of these pubes.

Starting to get ripe White Bullet Habs, these were really quick to mature. I've not tried any of them yet, I'm a little scared.

I've also started getting ripe Habanero Manzanos. Haven't tried these either yet, love the colour on them though. The plant has at least 35 fruits on it still, which is like 35 more than I had on most peppers last year. Could not be happier.

Thegreenchilemonster · Aug 31, 2016

Nice looking pods! I'm doing the exact same thing with my aji oro, except saving them to make jelly.

tsurrie · Aug 31, 2016

Congrats on the harvest!

Don't be scared of the white habaneros, just don't let the size fool you. It packs a lot of heat in that tiny body...

If you're not sure, taste it with some food first. It's very aromatic and the heat kicks in very fast, but it doesn't last long.

lobo · Sep 1, 2016

Wow your pubes are fantastic. Congrat. :party:

Comptine · Sep 1, 2016

tsurrie said:
Congrats on the harvest!

Don't be scared of the white habaneros, just don't let the size fool you. It packs a lot of heat in that tiny body...
If you're not sure, taste it with some food first. It's very aromatic and the heat kicks in very fast, but it doesn't last long.

I had one with some scrambled eggs yesterday. I agree that it's extremely aromatic. One wasn't particularly hot for me. I'll try two or three next time. I'm not sure I was too impressed with the taste at the end of the day, but I'm still reserving judgement until I've tried some more.

Picked my first Beni Highland today, I'll try to snap a picture later.

Comptine · Sep 4, 2016

I harvested my largest pepper yesterday. It's supposed to be a Farmer's Market Jalapeño.

I'm not convinced that it is though, the rest of the peppers on the plant aren't as large, but there's very little corking going on. (The image seems to have come out a lot brighter than intended.)

Quickie snap of the outside pepper square. They are all loaded, and a lot a slowly maturing.

Note to self for next season, I do not need 5 cayenne plants, 2-3 will suffice. I keep harvesting lots of them, and the plant keeps setting more. But between all the other peppers that I'm growing, I don't think I need this many cayennes.

The weather is still nice going inte September. Night temps are around 8-12C and day temps 17-23. So hopefully we won't be seeing a frost for quite a while still. I've got lots of green peppers on my plants, hundreds, if not thousands.

stickman · Sep 4, 2016

+1 on #254... The White Bullet Habs are very aromatic and not particularly hot for a Chinense pepper... Good for powder blends as they add their own layer of flavor but need other varieties to help them stand up.

That Farmer's Market Jalapeno looks like it crossed with a Corno de Toro sweet pepper. How is the heat?

I tried growing Beni Highlands last year, but they didn't make it outside... how do you like them for flavor and heat?

Nice to see your garden looking so lush. When is your first frost date usually? We've probably got at least four more weeks here.

Keep up the good work!

Comptine · Sep 4, 2016

stickman said:
+1 on #254... The White Bullet Habs are very aromatic and not particularly hot for a Chinense pepper... Good for powder blends as they add their own layer of flavor but need other varieties to help them stand up.

That Farmer's Market Jalapeno looks like it crossed with a Corno de Toro sweet pepper. How is the heat?

I tried growing Beni Highlands last year, but they didn't make it outside... how do you like them for flavor and heat?

Nice to see your garden looking so lush. When is your first frost date usually? We've probably got at least four more weeks here.

Keep up the good work!

I'm making a ristra with them as well as well now =D

You know, that pepper fired up quite a large bean chili I made, I'd say 6 ish portions big. I haven't tried it on it's own though. I doubt it's a Farmer's Market Jal though, some of the pods look really off. I had a few spuds in there too, but I forgot to put them in the picture. The onions, garlic, tomatoes, parsley, thyme, rosemary and aubergines are all home grown.

Still haven't had the chance to try one, it's maturing quite slow, the one mature one I had was given away. I'll let you know when I do get a chance to try it, should be tomorrow or the day after. I do like the shape on them.

Supposedly our first frost is mid September, but the forecast for the next 10 days looks really promising, I'd be shocked if we had a frost. Last year I made it onto October before we got hit. So I should be fine for the following month. I'm thinking I might experiment with putting candles in the greenhouse over night just to keep the temps over freezing for a few days. I reckon the Chinenses that have set fruit in the greenhouse will give me a few mature fruits before I have to call it. They've all been quite late to set, but we've got a few on nearly all. Still having problems with those damn slugs. I've showered the greenhouse with slug pellets, and I cut the ones I find in half.

Devv · Sep 4, 2016

Slugs:

I bet some rock salt or diatomaceous earth on the floor of the green house would end those slugs. Rock salt only if there's no way for it to leach out into the yard. We had a wet month and I pulled a few snails of off some plants. Just where do they come from? We live in a semi arid area, almost desert.

Congrats on the pubes this season, I try to grow them here...sigh.. with very limited success. Love the rista

I have a few of those little white habs going, I call them jelly bean habs..LOL I hope they're good!