Time of the season

A cold bastard of a front blew in from the American Middle West last night bringing with it a number of the usual seasonal associations: get a-rakin' Son, clear the gutters and do any pruning in preparation for snow, time to prepare for the annual deer hunt. But first I gotta bring in the chiles before a real freeze comes. The first real freeze looks likely to be next Wednesday, so I spent part of the morning harvesting.

Last peppers of the year come off the plants

This season's weather was odd; way wetter than usual. Consequently the selection of peppers is going to be different from previous years. Typically I would have a lot of long, slender, cayenne-type peppers, lots of little Bolivian Rainbow peppers and a bunch of Habaneros. The purple peppers came through, but there were very few Takanatsumes and only four, count 'em FOUR Habanero peppers.

Mutant Trinidad Moruga Scorpion peppers

What did produce well, for the first time ever, were some chiles that were sold as Trinidad Moruga Scorpions. They're not actually pure Morugas though; they were from seeds saved from the 2017 season and look more like Ghost peppers. They're certainly blisteringly hot, but they don't seem to be that much hotter than Habaneros. One chile will light up a chili con carne. Whatever the case, this year's picante sauce will be made from either Bolivian Rainbows, bastard Morugas or a blend of both.

Chillies

Autumn leapt directly into winter this year and the first hard freeze of the year came up with a howling wind. Per my habit, that meant a frigid evening of harvesting the remaining chiles from the plants.

All the colors of the rainbow - Santaka and Habanero chiles

As always with the final harvest, many of the chiles are still green with some in transition. Capsicum is basically a tropical perennial plant from Central America that doesn't know that ice and snow are coming to kill them. So they go about their business as though summer will continue forever. The last picking is consequently a snapshot of the plants which contain fruit at virtually all stages of development from flowering through red, ripeness. The Habaneros are particularly prismatic this year as I grew a red variety which transitions from green through an orangy-yellow stage to the final crimson colorway.

In addition to the mandatory Habaneros that make up the backbone of each year's crop, I planted two Japanese varieties and one Bolivian. The Japanese are the Santaka which I have not tried before and the Takanotsume, which I have grown before with great success. Back in 1996 when I was just getting started growing hot peppers in earnest, I was living in northwest Ohio in an apartment with access to about an acre of rich, black garden. Among the first batches of Picante sauce I ever made was a batch of Takanotsume, and to this day it is remembered by some of the very few, very lucky recipients. The Santaka is a similar chile, so I am hoping for similar results.

The Bolivian peppers are actually mongrels. They sprouted from saved Bolivian Rainbow seed, but as I am not a disciplined saver of seed, they are likely mixed with genes from nearby plants. They certainly did not display the lovely purple commonly associated with this particular cultivar. But they're packed with seeds, have nice heat and should make a good sauce. 

"Bolivian Rainbow" in X-mas colors!

So production of this year's picante sauce is well underway, with the early ripe Habanero already in the bottles. There will be just enough green chiles to get out a run of picante verde in each variety and probably a couple of bottles of field blend. Just a little something to warm a body through the winter...

Ripe, red organic Habanero, distilled vinegar and a squirt of lime juice. Nothing else.