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Stefan_W's 2013 Pods A-Ripenin'! Glog

I am going to start the new glog for my upcoming growing season on a bit of a personal note. One year ago tomorrow (January 3rd) is the one year anniversary of the day that my daughter was diagnosed with a tumour that is lodged in the middle of her brain. The past year has involved treatments and hospital stays, and there were at least three different points when we were pretty sure she was not going to make it. But she is a fighter, and nothing could keep her down for long.

Sofia has personally planted every pepper and tomato seed that I have started in the past three growing seasons. She beat the odds last year to help me, and once again she is defying what medicine has to say to help me out this year.

We started a jalapeno plant about a week ago just for the sake of watching it grow, because we both love it so much. One of the jalapenos grew to the point that it had its firt couple of leaves, so we transplanted him into a bigger pot. While we were at it I decided to put in some aji lemondrops, partly because they take a long time to fruit up and I wanted to give them a huge head start.

This is the jalapeno plant. I pulled the second one out because we did not need it, and discovered that the roots had grown all of the way down to the bottom of the cell.
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My daughter personally doing the transplant.
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Her aim is better than mine, and so it turned out perfectly.
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Next up was taking out the lemondrop seeds from peppermania.
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I need a few extras of this type, so I asked Sofia to plant two seeds in each of the four cells. Two plants will be for us, and whatever else grows will be given away to good friends.
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Two of the three tiers in my lighting stand are currently being used as toy shelves, which is cool for now. The lights are adjustable, and moved down to get close to the seedling.
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The heating pad works extremely well, and once the cells are covered the top clouds up in no time.
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A happy early jalapeno seedling in his new home. I thought I heard "feeeeeed meeeeee" coming from that direction, but I'm not sure.
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That's it for today, folks! Welcome to my new glog :welcome:
 
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Devv said:
Glad you're coming around, and just in time for the weekend!
 
Thanks for the opinions too!
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The flu is now gong through the rest of the house, so I am catching a minute here while I can. It feels great to be over it, but it sucks that everyone else is still stick.
WalkGood said:
Great harvest, pictures and editorial ... Have a great weekend mon!
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I do my best, and hopefully someone will benefit from what I have written. Taste is a very personal thing, but if someone agrees with my writeups on a couple of varieties they can make the leap that they will have a decent chance of agreeing on others. If someone completely disagrees with me they can do the opposite of what I do. It's all good :)
 
When I got home from work today I found a package from Rick (Stickman) waiting for me. I knew it was coming, but man this set some kind of speed record for a package coming up from the USA. I was expecting it two weeks or more down the road.
 
Rick included his "kitchen sink" powder, which gave off a great smell as soon as I opened the package, and some seeds to try out next year.
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My wife was fixing up some wraps with leftover chicken and cooked veggies, and I sprinkled some on the salsa. I put about a teaspoon on my wrap, mixed into the salsa. She asked me if the powder was hot, and I decided to play with her a bit by saying "how would I know, I haven't had the chance to taste it yet!" She took a tiny bit of the impregnated salsa into her mouth and said "wow, that flavour is awesome" and then exactly 3 second later she was yelling "HOT! HOT! HOT! HOT!" It was really funny.
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I really enjoyed this blend, and if it was on sale I would buy it in a heartbeat. The combination of flavours from the different peppers was outstanding, and I found myself trying to pick out the individual pepper tastes (good luck to me on that one, seeing as Rick added all sorts of varieties I have not grown). Really a superb, rich flavour that would work well for anything I would use powder on. After it sat in my mouth for a while I started to think that this would actually be really good on white fleshed fish, even though it does not have a citrous taste. I just think it would go well with fish, hashbrowns, and fresh squeezed lemon. 

+1 points for flavour, +1 for being versatile and complex, and +1 for my wife actually loving the taste (although she would take a tiny bit of it at a time). By my math that's a great powder!
 
Glad you liked the powder Stefan! Be sure to tell your wife that it'll clear up everybody's sinuses, OK? ;)
 
You were saying you wanted to grow more sweet pepper varieties so Sofia could try them, so all 3 varieties of seeds I sent were sweet. Cheers!
 
Devv said:
Nice score from Rick Stefan!
 
Glad you enjoyed it too!
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Yeah, it was awesome! 

stickman said:
Glad you liked the powder Stefan! Be sure to tell your wife that it'll clear up everybody's sinuses, OK? ;)
 
You were saying you wanted to grow more sweet pepper varieties so Sofia could try them, so all 3 varieties of seeds I sent were sweet. Cheers!
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I am definitely going to be upping the sweet peppers next season. I had a brutally bad growing season this year, and I still have 5 large freezer bags of supers in stored away in my freezer for the winter. Variety is nice, but that is overkill. Plus, as I told you before, Sofia has been frustrated that she can't try the majority of peppers in the garden, which is a fail on my part. Next year I am going to seriously cut back the supers, maybe add a medium or two, and focus on the sweet peppers. I will definitely grow the ones you sent over, and they are much appreciated :)
 
People in the household are getting healthier now, so I decided to experiment with some new peppers and make a sauce. 
 
My first pick was the mako akokasrade. It is one of those rare peppers that I gravitate to, but to be honest I have not been impressed with it so far. The plant was finicky, and it was among the last to set pods. So far I have picked about 8 or so of them, with only a few more on the plant, so the yield is low. The smallish sized pod itself goes from green to yellow, and then turns a nice orange colour when it is ready.
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When I cut it open it had the classic hab smell, which was not a good start for me because I am not a hab person. When I cut it open and looked closely at it I was really impressed with the amount of oil in the pod.
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I cut the end off of one of the halves, popped it into my mouth and, well, I was a bit disappointed. The heat was pretty high, maybe in the mid-range of habs. The flavour just wasn't all that great to me. It had some hab flavour, but not quite as bold. It really did not stand out at all, so I was left focusing on the heat rather than the flavour. I have 5 large freezer bags of pods in my freezer, and my fridge is quickly filling up with assorted sauce experiments, so I made an executive decision and just turfed the pods. The would just end up sitting in the freezer for a few months before getting turfed at that point, so I just sped up the process.
 
The next pod I decided to try for the first time was the yellow 7 pod SR gigantic. Those who have followed this glog know that I kept two of these plants, and one of them ended up red. The pods on this second plant quickly went from yellow to orange, which I understand is in keeping with this variety. 
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When I cut this medium-large open it had a nice amount of oil in it, and the smell was fruity and pleasant. 
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I took a bit of the end off and popped it into my mouth. HOLY MOTHER that was hot! Wow. I put the heat on this particular pod above the average ghost pepper pod. It instantly felt like bees were stinging my lips, and I felt it burning the whole way down to my gut. Moving past the high heat level for a moment, it also tasted great. In fact, I put it behind only the Madam Jeanette for flavour amongst my new peppers. Simply outstanding, and good enough that I am seriously considering overwintering this plant. The heat and flavour of this true variety put the not yellow 7s into perspective, and I came to conclusion that those were probably crossed with habs. The heat on the not yellows was only a fraction of the heat level of this pod, and the taste of the not yellows was bland in comparison. 
 
Seeing as I liked this pod so much, I decided to make up a quick sauce with it. If put it into a pot with canned peaches, pineapple, and a couple of passion fruit. I squeezed a whole lemon into it and added some sambuca, mostly because I found out I was out of drambuie and the liquor store was already closed. I cooked it all together, blended, and then reduced for about 15-20 minutes to get rid of some of the excess syrup from the cans. It reduced about 15%. 
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The sauce was really quite nice. I found the sambuca overpowered it a bit, which was why it was not my first choice, but it came together nicely as it cooled.
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Everyone enjoyed this one, and my stepdaughter kept coming back for seconds and thirds and tenths. 
 
I hope you all are well, and that you are having a great week so far!
 
Stefan_W said:
The next pod I decided to try for the first time was the yellow 7 pod SR gigantic. Those who have followed this glog know that I kept two of these plants, and one of them ended up red. The pods on this second plant quickly went from yellow to orange, which I understand is in keeping with this variety.
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Nice job on the reviews Stefan! Sorry the Mako Akokasrade didn't live up to expectations. They look a lot like the Criolla Sella pods I grew... I wonder how much different they taste from each other. The CS is thin fleshed, and very prolific. I dried all of my pods for powder.
 
I thought you'd like the Yellow 7... smooth, fruity flavor and it really packs a punch. If you like Jerk marinade, substitute some Yellow 7s for Scotch Bonnets. I think you'll like the results. The only drawback to the large-pod variety is that I think it's not quite stable... one of yours ended up red, and one of mine ended up brown. Cheers!
 
If I am not mistaken the Criolla Sellas are ajis, so the taste would be really different. The Makos taste a lot like a harsh version of a red hab to me. 
 
It would make sense that the yellow 7s are not quite stable yet considering the variation I am getting. The orange (yellow) ones are pretty consistent from pod to pod, but the not yellows that turned out red have some pretty big variation among the pods in terms of shape. Based on that and the heat difference between the two plants I am thinking it is more likely an accidental cross, but who knows. I do know I want to grow those yellows again, because the taste rocks!
 
Your sauce looks great and if the family is coming back for more the proof is in the pudding so to say. I also enjoyed your take and writing on your mako akokasrade, nice read. That said there has to be someone out there that must like them although I wouldn’t know as I’ve never tried it. Have a great weekend back at ya and your family :)
 
PS nice pics to boot!
 
WalkGood said:
Your sauce looks great and if the family is coming back for more the proof is in the pudding so to say. I also enjoyed your take and writing on your mako akokasrade, nice read. That said there has to be someone out there that must like them although I wouldn’t know as I’ve never tried it. Have a great weekend back at ya and your family :)
 
PS nice pics to boot!
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Thank you! My pictures have been slowly improving as the season has moved along. I usually do try to save pods to give away, but 5 scrawny little pods that did not taste all that good did not seem worthwhile. I give very hot and superhot pods and sauces away at work when I get the chance, so people who like hot stuff are always taken care of. 
 
Yes sir that Yellow 7 pod is hot! And a different kind of heat, in a sauce the heat creeps, at least the ones I got did. Great flavor too!
 
Glad to see your take on it is similar to mine, only pod I ever tasted that made me put ice on my tongue..LOL it just kept on coming!
 
And I don't blame you for growing more of what your family likes, that's what it's all about.
 
Have a great weekend!
 
Devv said:
Yes sir that Yellow 7 pod is hot! And a different kind of heat, in a sauce the heat creeps, at least the ones I got did. Great flavor too!
 
Glad to see your take on it is similar to mine, only pod I ever tasted that made me put ice on my tongue..LOL it just kept on coming!
 
And I don't blame you for growing more of what your family likes, that's what it's all about.
 
Have a great weekend!
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Did you get the bee sting feeling on your lips too? I actually like peppers that get me on the lips, but this one was more severe than other times I have experienced that feeling. 
 
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