Vezena Piperka

Hello and welcome to my Vezena Piperka glog.

I have started 6 seeds which have just sprouted, they will be starting life under lights and when our days get a bit longer I will move them into a room that gets 80% of the days sunlight, then when it warms up outside Ieill move them into the greenhouse. They will be growing in a organic soil mix.

I dont know so much about these chilies but they certainly look cool and the reviews I have seen say they are very tasty.

I see there are 2 versions, one that produces large pods and ther other produces small. I believe I have the large ones.

From the little bits of information I can find about Vezena Piperka they seem not to produce alot of pods, but what they lack in yield they make up for in taste and cool looks.

First photo, the Vezena Piperka are the ones in the purple pots

 

[CaneDog]

Yeah they do!  Great picture.

 

[Swinglish]

You will love them.  I grew the large size last year and bought the seeds for the small size to try this year as well.  While not super productive they are definitely still worth growing.  I'll just grow more plants this year.  Besides drying some for a very tasty flake, they were really terrific on the grill.  I was worried I might need to peel the skin because of the texture, but it softened up nicely once cooked so I just left it on.  
 
I should add that while production wasn't huge, my plants weren't particularly large either - about the size my jalapeno plants grow.  So I'll probably plant them a bit closer together this year as well to up the production per square foot.

When do you start to see the elephant skin effect appearing on the pods? Is it when it starts to ripen or should I see it from when the pods start to grow?

 

[Swinglish]

The day after I ask I start to see the effect appearing....
 

 

[zendog]

The day after I ask I start to see the effect appearing....
 
 

 
That looks similar to what I saw.  I think mine were about half size before I saw the lines start to come in.  One thing I noticed when harvesting is that it was easy to leave them on the plant a little too long and they would start to get softer and almost begin to dry on the plant.  This was fine for drying them, but I also liked them a lot on the grill so when I wanted to use them for anything but drying I'd keep an eye on ripening and pick them just as or even slightly before they were fully deep red all over.  

 

[Swinglish]

 
That looks similar to what I saw.  I think mine were about half size before I saw the lines start to come in.  One thing I noticed when harvesting is that it was easy to leave them on the plant a little too long and they would start to get softer and almost begin to dry on the plant.  This was fine for drying them, but I also liked them a lot on the grill so when I wanted to use them for anything but drying I'd keep an eye on ripening and pick them just as or even slightly before they were fully deep red all over.  

Thanks I'll take note of that. I had a piri piri plant whose pods behaved the same,

 

[PaulG]

This is n unknown variety for me.
 
Looking forward to seeing the mature pods.

 

[Swinglish]

The first pod that started growing had to be discarded,  it started going brown and mushy down one side. It smells wonderful but it's still to immature to get any real taste, although I did try it before I threw it away. 
 

 

[PaulG]

A couple of those seeds look almost ripe.
 
What did you think of the green flavor?

 

[Swinglish]

A couple of those seeds look almost ripe.
 
What did you think of the green flavor?

It didn't really have any flavour, I had a little spicy tickle on my tongue like drinking a soda water that's been in a glass to long and lost 99% of the fizz. I have so many plants in front of the windows, the Vezena Piperkas havr the front row seat but I think it gets to hot right in front of the glass which is why I had this issue. Tomorrow I will move them back a bit and hope I dont have the same problem with any other pods

 

[roper2008]

Last time I tasted a Rheza pepper, fully red, it was very sweet, and hot for me.  My tolerance isn’t really high.  I have some little seedling growing for this season.  I found an old lousy picture of it.  Don’t mind the dog poop.

 

[PaulG]

some dogs just don't have
any manners.
 
Those look like good sized pods.
The peppers, I mean.

 

[Swinglish]

Last time I tasted a Rheza pepper, fully red, it was very sweet, and hot for me.  My tolerance isnt really high.  I have some little seedling growing for this season.  I found an old lousy picture of it.  Dont mind the dog poop.

How many pods did you average in each plant?

 

[Swinglish]

The vezena piperkas are next to the window with a few rows of plants behind them, but today I pulled them out so I can give them a proper inspection to make sure there healthy and no critters are on the plants.  So I was able to get some better photos of them.....
 
The last photo is the 4th vezena piperka among some other plants, that one has flowers but hasnt set fruit yet. Its alot taller than the other ones
 

 

[Swinglish]

And another pod has gone bad, it's not on the same plant as the other bad pod.
 

 

[PaulG]

That looks like sun scald to me.
 
the other pods look good, plants, too.
What color when ripe?

 

[Swinglish]

they are red peppers with elephant skin. I pulled this photo from google images, I dont expect mine will be this big. Yes its definitely sun scald.  We are still going below 0C some nights and yesterday we had a little snow so moving them outside is still not a option. 

 

[Swinglish]

The pod looks to be ripening from the bad bit out, I will wait it out and see if I can get some good seeds and a little bit of fruit to taste.
 

 

[PaulG]

The rest of the pod should be good. If it ripens up
in good form, you can just cut off the scalded part
when you prep it.
 
That is an amazing pepper in post #36. Hope yours
look the same way!

 

[Swinglish]

I picked the sun scaled fruit today,  It contained about 170 seeds with 99.9% looking good. The vast majority of the seeds grow in the top 3cm of the fruit which is nice and makes cleaning the inside alot easier. I had a little taste taste but I'm going to hold off on forming an opinion untill I have tried a good pod.
 

 
 
 
I noticed more fruit starting to ripen

 
 

 

[PaulG]

Alright, looks  like you have some viable
seeds there! And some usable pod  
 
Hope you can evade more sun scald. 
Sometimes hard to strike a balance
with Mr. Nature! Feast or Famine!
 
Will the normally ripe pods show that
sort of variegation in the pod shown
in second photo above? Or is it a result
of the sun scald on that pod?