Siv's third time's a charm

My first year: http://thehotpepper.com/topic/70997-sivs-2019-first-time-glog/
My second year: http://thehotpepper.com/topic/73302-sivs-second-time-lucky-2020-glog/page-10
 
Planning is currently underway for year 3. I'll probably start seeds in February with a view to putting them out in March. My wife complained several times this year that I didn't grow enough peppers that she could use for cooking so this year I'm going to remedy that. I didn't grow any annuums last year so will be going for several this year. I'm not going to bother with pubes as they can't seem to take the Texas heat. I'm also not going to bother with baccatums this year either. I'm going to aim for 15-20 varieties allowing for 2-3 plants of each. I have way too many seeds so will try and avoid buying more!
 
The current plan:
Dorset Naga - only had one successful plant last year and I like the look so want to grow more
Bahamian Goat - my current all time favourite pepper
Orange Ribbon - a surprise favourite for 2020 and great raw
Leviathan Gnarly Scorpion - hot and great for sauces, hopefully this time they are leviathan as last year they were smaller
White Ghost - a favourite from 2019 and a failure in 2020; hopefully redeemed in 2021
Fatalii - I didn't get as many as I wanted in 2020 and I do like these
Antem Aci Dolma - new for 2021
Sadabahar - new for 2021
Buena Mulata - new for 2021
Bangalore Whippets Tail - new for 2021
White Thai - new for 2021
African Bird Orange - new for 2021 and another attempt at a piri piri type
Yellow Biquinho - new for 2021; haven't tried this style before
Clavo White F1 - new for 2021 and an experiment
 
For the hydro, I'm going to cut down on the number of buckets and move them back a little and separate them into three lots of seven buckets. This will give me a bit better control and will also allow me to add support between the pillars to cope with these plants as they grow pretty large.
 
For soil, I'm toying with the idea of replacing most of the grow bags with raised beds made from steel stock tanks. I put the bags on a tarp and while this keeps the grass down There are some spots where water collects and this led to a bunch of mosquitos. The pools of water also makes it annoying to walk between the rows. I'll have to think about this as it's a bit of an investment. I may do the tanks in the spots where the water is the worst and cut down the tarp coverage. I have a while though to think about this.
 
My wife wants me to grow jalapenos but I'm loathed to grow something I can easily buy whenever I want at the grocery store for little money. And we don't use them that often anyway. Perhaps an odd variety - I have Tiger Jalapeno seeds.
 
Any thoughts/suggestions from the community?

 

[dragonsfire]

Very nice Fruit !

 

[PaulG]

Great picking, @Siv. Nothing like a great crew for little help.
Hope they helped with the processing, as well!

 

[Siv]

First batch of 2021 sauces bottled up. These are all made with potato as a thickener

 

[Mildfruit]

Very pro looking hot sauces! I really like the look of the bottles, what are they called?

 

[Siv]

Very pro looking hot sauces! I really like the look of the bottles, what are they called?

They're PET bottles - the same as soda bottles and the same material used for Sriracha bottles. Just search for PET squeeze bottle. Note that the style of lid isn't airtight so I have put some separate pressure activated seals on top to seal the bottles.

 

[PaulG]

Well done, @Siv!

 

[Siv]

I made this lot a while ago but just got around to making labels.

@CaneDog the Datil sauce follows the recipe you found with a few minor tweaks.

 

[CaneDog]

Miso Spicy? Hahah. That's awesome. Love the names and labels - and the sauces look great too!

I'm still looking forward to trying that. I froze my datil pods for future saucing when things slow down a bit.

 

[Siv]

Still too many damn peppers! I took a quick look at the hydro and the Thunder Chacho brown has a ton of pods that I need to harvest. I didn't really notice these when they were green but there are quite a few there.

The White Thai also have a ton of pods that I should pull off - or perhaps let them turn red...

Finally, the Datil volunteers are still pumping out pods and flowers - I can safely say that these accidents have been some of the best producers this year. I think I may ferment these.

 

[ahayastani]

I can safely say that these accidents have been some of the best producers this year.

A similar situation here with (non)-KS White Thai... As if the plants knew they were "unwanted" and understood they had to walk the extra mile to make themselves "desired".

 

[PaulG]

I didn’t know there was a red variety of Datil, but
my yellows were awesome producers, as well.

 

[Siv]

I left to go visit my sister in California over Christmas and just got back to Texas on Sunday night. We drove through New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, Arizona and Nevada on the way but by far the highlight for me was Santa Fe and seeing all the peppers hanging around the city as decorations. I managed to pick up some dried chipotle and guajillo peppers and will be turning them into powder shortly.

We had some brief freezing temps in Texas while away so yesterday I grabbed the kids and pulled as many pods as I could from the Datil volunteers and half the hydros. Lots of sauce making this week!

On a slightly sadder note, two of my ferments had molded. One was a sauerkraut from 2020 and had some white mold on the top but the bottom smelled absolutely divine as I was tossing it down the garbage disposal. Sad to lose that and totally my fault as the airlock had dried up! The other mold was the recently started datil/tomato ferment. This was a problem child from the start as the mash puffed up early and came out the airlock. I tried to remedy it by removing some liquid but I probably took out too much. In any case, I'm not so sad about losing this one as I have a ton more datils. I'll likely do the same thing again but with sliced peppers and tomatoes rather than a mash.

The soil side has been hit hard with most of the plants now dead or on the way. I'll leave them to dry up and deal with them in a month or two. I was hoping to rescue one as a bonchi but they all look pretty far gone.

All in all an odd season for me. I didn't pay nearly as much attention to the plants this year, I even stopped feeding the hydros about half way through and they still produced plenty of peppers but the plants were more manageable than last year. My lack of attention on the plants also meant I was missing from THP for a few months which is not a good thing - reading the glogs helps motivate me to get out and tend to the plants. Something I must remedy next year.

My two biggest learnings from 2021 are:
1, When your wife asks you to plant less spicy peppers, do so with only one or two plants, not most of them. I really missed my superhots this year.
2, A potato added to your sauce recipe is a wonderful thing.

Happy New Year everyone and I'll see you in my 2022 glog.

 

[dragonsfire]

Yummy

 

[ahayastani]

1, When your wife asks you to plant less spicy peppers, do so with only one or two plants, not most of them. I really missed my superhots this year.

Ha! Same story here... But 2022 will beagain! See you in your 2022 GLOG

 

[CaneDog]

Happy New Year, Siv. Looking forward to following your 2022 adventures.

 

[Downriver]

Sounds like you had a nice trip Siv. Great way to start off the new year by making some sauce. Nice! Looking forward to your 2022 GLOG.

Happy New Year!

 

[PaulG]

Good luck this season, @Siv.