The temperatures are getting real dismal and my greenhouse/cold frame isn't going to be able to keep the plants warm at night. I decided to pick all of my scotch bonnets last night. I have been real excited to give these a try since I planted the seeds in February. From 5 plants I picked a total of 363 pods weighing in at 14.4lbs total! Most of them are still green with a few just starting to change color. I put them in a very large brown paper bag and will be watching everyday to see if they will ripen. I had intended to dig the plants up and put them in pails until they ripened the pods. The weight of the peppers was causing the branches to break off the main stock of the plants, while I was trying to transplant. I gave up after trying the second plant and decided to harvest the pods.
There were a few pods that were ripe or very close to ripe. I cut open the ripest pod for a look and took my first bite. I was expecting it to be similar heat to a habanero, but there was absolutely zero heat at all. It just tasted like a red pepper. I knew that the shape could vary in the bonnets, so I was hoping that this is all that I was dealing with, when I first started to see pods form this summer. I hope that other pods will come up with heat, but I have a feeling that these were either cross pollinated or miss labeled when the seeds were packaged. Either way I will have a lot of pods to make stuff with. I just hope they ripen in the paper bag.
There were a few pods that were ripe or very close to ripe. I cut open the ripest pod for a look and took my first bite. I was expecting it to be similar heat to a habanero, but there was absolutely zero heat at all. It just tasted like a red pepper. I knew that the shape could vary in the bonnets, so I was hoping that this is all that I was dealing with, when I first started to see pods form this summer. I hope that other pods will come up with heat, but I have a feeling that these were either cross pollinated or miss labeled when the seeds were packaged. Either way I will have a lot of pods to make stuff with. I just hope they ripen in the paper bag.
