Chili and Spice Thread!

Ok, I'm a big sucker for spicy food, so let's have a thread for it.

I'm new to gardening and growing, but I've been growing some chili plants for a couple of years and this year my mother gave me some new plants - trouble is I don't know what they are, although mummy says she thinks the picture on the seed packet had red chili's on it, so guessing they're not ripe yet.

They're doing really well in this summer and I've got lots of chili's on the plants that are looking quite healthy.

If anyone could help me identifying this, that'd be awesome.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/be7abd04a1b6.jpg[/atsimg]

Sorry, about the poor embedding

Edit:

...and bad photo, will try again tomorrow.

Anyhoo, chili talk anyone?

[edit on 24/6/1010 by jokei]

I recently (after a bad experience with hot foods) have finally got my craving for spicy foods back.

My favourite peppers are Habenaros.
Its also the type of pepper that scarred me for awhile...they are THAT hot.
A buddy of mine is a chef who has recently got me interested in collecting different types of hot sauces.
I only have 2 right now but am getting more next time I shop at my special place.
I want to get a nice spicy jerk sauce next I think.
I have recently been dipping tortilla chips into hotsauce for a snack.

Looking at the pic,if it is cut in half then it looks kinda like a jalapeno but I am no expert.

reply to post by DrumsRfun


Hey man, pretty sure it's not a Jabanero, they're thicker???

I love sauces, there's some really great ones out there, a friend got me a spice/rack of different varieties, they were really good.

My (generic) favourites come from here:

www.enconasauces.co.uk...

Edit to add:

This place looks cool too:

www.chilliworld.com...

[edit on 24/6/1010 by jokei]

reply to post by jokei


It looks more like a jalepeno...a habenero is one of my favs which is why I mentioned it,but no,I agree it is not a habenero.
That site has some pretty wicked looking sauces.
The jerk bbq sauce and the chilli bbq sauce looks pretty good.
I get my sauces from some ethnic store that sells stuff you don't find in grocery stores here,and its really cheap compared to grocery store prices.
They have a whole isle of just hot sauces.
Last time I was there,I bought preserved hot peppers in a jar,some hotsauce,and some dehydrated hot peppers for my dehydrated soup packets I prepare for camping.
When I camp I also love to have roasted peanuts in a pan over the fire just doused in hotsauce.
MMMMMMMMMM

reply to post by DrumsRfun


Ethnic stores are the best, especially if you get to know the workers/owners - you can get some awesome cooking suggestions.

If you didn't see my edit, that chiliworld.com has some chili sauces hotter than pepper spray...

lol - that's a legit flame!

OK, this is interesting, I actually grew chillies commercially until recently. Looks like a long slim cayenne, but need a clearer picture. They turn red eventually. Also love spicy food, at least we can agree on that:-) Chillies love organic compost and they do not like chemical fertilizers and pesticides, try tobacco powder for insect control. You can also boil a handful of chillies in a pot on the stove for about half an hour, let it cool and use the strained mixture in a spray bottle to spray on the leaves and stems for insect control.

reply to post by Saul of Tarsus


Hey, thanks for the reply and excellent to have someone knowledgable. Took me a while to crop the picture (Not my field of expertise). For reference the coin is a British 20 pence, which is about 2cm/half an inch (ish) across.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/c018bd75c05e.jpg[/atsimg]

These have been picked, they're quite hot raw, but have shown no signs of going green yet... there's still a fair amount on the plants.

Thanks a lot for the insect repellant tip - I've no intention of using anything chemical on them.

reply to post by jokei


Yep, those are long slim cayennes, my favourite, can eat them raw in a salad till the cows come home. They do turn red eventually, but I also like them green, not really any hotter when they turn red.

reply to post by Saul of Tarsus


Excellent, thankyou - as soon as I get enough I'll be making a batch of my "evil" chili sauce and I might even give the recipe, or if I get excited enough do a photo-pictorial (actually I think I will do that).

What are your thoughts on growing from seed? The chilis have an awful lot of seeds in them. Previously I've just popped a whole chili in a pot of compost and let nature take its course, but I'm guessing there's better ways to do this???

Here's another picture of my other strain/variety:

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/8b4715c299f4.jpg[/atsimg]

This one was gifted to me by an old colleague, his wife was 2nd generation Chinese and apparently these do come from China, they are viciously hot. No ideas on variety.

A little bump and note that I can't believe I forgot this:



It's not that easy to get everything in the UK, but with a bit of imagination you can dig out some replacement ingredients.

I thought that I would drop by to post a picture of my arsenal.




My collection has grown a lot since 1999. Some sauces I have not been able to replace, I can not find "Justin Wilson" brand for a few years now.

[edit on 3-8-2010 by ChicUFO]

I implore all of my fellow heat lovers to acquire themselves the most delicious of all the spicy concoctions...Sriracha.

As a chef, I find it to have as many uses as there are seconds in a day. It can be seamlessly incorporated into any type of sauce, even cream sauces. It functions better than ketchup as a condiment. Hell...it can even clear up your nasal congestion.

reply to post by ChicUFO


Aww man, that's making me jealous - a very respectable collection sir.

Can we get a review of the best of the best of those?

reply to post by vimanarider


Awaiting pay day and I'll be ordering some of that, not very expensive - but I can only find it online here in the UK.

www.shopsafe.co.uk...

Gonna wait until the end of the summer, then make some of my chili sauce - pictorial to follow!

reply to post by jokei


That is the stuff, jokei. No it is not expensive at all. In fact...a better value cannot be found. You will love it.

reply to post by jokei


Hi Jokei,

Out here in India we simply call them "Green Chilli". It's used a lott in our local cuisine and also eaten raw. I don't know much about them though all I learned from my mother about this chilli is the smaller they are the more spicy. The longer ones are not too spicy. Here are few pictures of the local chillies





Out here the local vegetable vendors usually gives you handful or two free when you are buying vegetables unless you are specifically buying large amount of chillies.

Thanks for all the replies so far, interesting stuff - let's see what my final year harvest brings.

So far I have almost of a kilo of homegrown chilis!!!

I do a lot of cooking. Not sure what others would think, but no one will eat any other cooking in my house except mine. I get requests from family members all the time.

I am a big fan of spicey foods. but i don't see the need for an "arsenal". I have pickled jalapeno's in the fridge (usually diced, occassionally sliced). I buy cayenne powder in 2 lb containers (about 2 times a year), and fresh peppers as needed (i prefer jalapeno/serrano mixes when making a sauce, scotch bonnets for the "real heat").

everything gets a dusting of cayenne in this house. Everything, including sometimes dessert (a little back bite on a fruity desert just adds another dimension to the awesome).

Even the 12 year old is a cayenne addict.

It looks like the ordinary Green Pepper ,nothing special,it looks really hot,and i like peppers very much,i can't eat without the spicy flavor.

Some great peppers there!

Nice to see you having fruit on your plants. I'm a big fan of spicy food myself, and I do almost all the growing myself. Having some problems with my peppers, though. I have two different strains at the time, Tabasco (Louisiana pepper, that is..) and Fishpepper. The Tabasco is supposed to be a perennial strain, so no wonder it will take time for it to flower and mature, especially during the winter when I have to keep it in the window.

The problem is the other one, Fishpepper (annual strain). It has started to produce flowers a few times, but the flowers dry out, and it just keeps vegging. Not a very hot one, but interesting strain that produces red, green and yellow peppers at the same time. Would love to get some ripe peppers myself..any suggestions what the cause might be for the withering of flowers? Could it be lack of nutrients, or wrong ratio of N-P-K values?

Keep up the good growing!