Seed Etiquette (JHC)

Bicycle808

Bicycle808

I have been inventorying my seeds. I have a lot. Too many to handle; if i never order another seed, or accept any gifts/trades, it would likely take me years to grow thru this pile i got. I have almost everything i need for 2020's grow; i need to buy some dried Guajillos to save seeds from, and I'm awaiting some Zapotec seeds from a very kind and generous THP member.

The only thing I'm wanting for is Jamaican Hot Chocolate seeds. I grew JHCs the very first year i grew: 2017. The next year, i grew Chocolate Habs, which were fine but maybe not as productive as the JHC, plus i liked how the JHCs grew rather short and very bushy, whereas the Choc Habs grew taller but less dense. I'd grow chocolate Habs again, i guess, but i don't have seeds for those... So long as I'm hunting down new seeds, i might as week get the ones i want.

Last year, i grew Chocolate Scotch Bonnets. I only kept two plants; one produced tons of red pods, and the other produced big, Bonnetesque-shaped brown pods with good flavor, but not nearly as many as like, plus they went from almost-ripe to mushy faster than any other Chinense I've grown. I lost track of the chiles i gave away, but my one buddy had a plant threw the nice brown pods, but very few and very late (the rest of his grow went really well...) I still have seeds for these Chocolate Bonnets, but I'm not exactly eager to grow them in 2020.

So, i want to get some JHC seeds. But it's tough to want to order two packets of JHCs and do an entire order for under $10, especially when I'm sitting on like a zillion seeds i don't need. I'm not sure how to approach this one. So, I'm turning to the good ppl of THP for advice.

Any ideas?
 
JHCs sound nice.  Last year a local friend gave me a couple dozen choc habs he had grown.  Now in the past I was never fond of "chocolate" varieties as those I had tried I found too bitter.  I tried his choc habs and they were great pepper - I made some fine sauce with them.  I hope I saved seed (and can find it) as I should grow some this year.
 
Have a great season, B.
 
cone9 said:
JHCs sound nice.  Last year a local friend gave me a couple dozen choc habs he had grown.  Now in the past I was never fond of "chocolate" varieties as those I had tried I found too bitter.  I tried his choc habs and they were great pepper - I made some fine sauce with them.  I hope I saved seed (and can find it) as I should grow some this year.
 
Have a great season, B.
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Thanks for the well-wishing.

It's always seemed to me that chileheads are going to either find chocolate Chinense to be delightfully earthy and delicious or, like you & i, they're gonna find then to be bitter. To me, for the longest time, they were not only bitter, but they also had a harsh, acrid tone that seemed more chemical-y than organic. Like you've mentioned with your chocolate Habs, the degree of bitterness can vary from variety to variety.. But i think the most important variable is how the person eating the chocolate pods perceives the flavor.

For me, i found that those harsh notes to disappear entirely if the chocolate pods are dried, whether conventionally dehydrated or smoked. Further, my appreciation for the fresh chocolate Chinense has improved dramatically last year. I'm not sure if my use of chocolate powder, changed my olfactory perceptions, or if it is down to my massive chile addiction overall, or if it is just one of those things that randomly changes over time. (As a child, i detested both mushrooms and cilantro. Nowadays, i absolutely love each of those flavors...)


Ruid said:
Not sure about JHC, but chocolate habaneros and chocolate scotch bonnets are both delicious for cooking AND snacking.
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I agree that both of those are good varieties with versatility, but the strain chocolate Bonnets i grew mostly didn't grow true. The one plant that produce brown pods, the pods were tasty and big and logged incredible, but they retired our more quickly than anything else I've grown. Basically, you want to pick them and use them next day, at the latest.

JHCs vs Chocolate Habs, though, for me it's more about the plant than the fruit. If you gave new one pod of each and made me run the Pepsi Challenge on them, I'd be hard pressed to guess which is which. But having grown both, the JHC reminds me more of my Yellow Bonnets in terms growth: low, bushy, compact yet lush, and incredibly productive. That's kinda my jam, from a gardening perspective. The Chocolate Habs that i grew were also pretty productive, but the plant was more like a lil tree than a dense bush. The difference was probably not nearly as dramatic as I'm describing it, but the difference was apparent, to me, significant
 
Also, i probably mentioned this further up the thread, but "chocolate Habanero" is a pretty generic name, whereas "Jamaican Hawt Chocolate" is a thoroughly Bitchin' appellation.
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Ruid said:
Anything beats naming a pepper a series of letters and numbers that can't be pronounced.
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Very true, and I've actually decided against growing certain strains bc the alphanumeric names just fail to stimulate my chile-nards.


The_NorthEast_ChileMan said:
 
Dunno'....... Smooky doesn't really really roll off the tongue when chatting about super-hot peppers.....>NAGA SMOOKY RAINBOW
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This would be an excellent point, except Justin described these as being almost mild. Personally, it irks my soul that Drax didn't spell it as "Smookie."
 
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