pepper planter one

Peppers are going to take a few days to post.  ( thunk fans, my thursday thunks will post later today )  First let me explain that there are many basic types of peppers.  Bell, Cayenne, Cubanelle, Pequin, Aji, Habanero, Blocky, Cluster, Anaheim, Ancho/poblano, Tabasco, Lantern, Banana,Chiltepin, Jalapeno, Cherry, Serrano, Peperoncini, Squash - wow.  Each of these have many different types of plants whose peppers range in sweetness/heat, size, color, ripening time.   So one pepper that is an anaheim can be a completely different heat/ size/ color than another.  I never knew this until recently.  I thought habanero was the pepper- i didn't realize there were almost 100 different habanero's out there.  Granted a lot of this is due to hybridization, but still makes picking out peppers a bit tough for me.

 This is Pequin Large black Chili.  As the name implies, it is a Pequin pepper, it really doesn't have a large pepper IMHO, 1" long by 1/2 " wide.  It is a late season pepper with purple leaves ( kinda cool) and black fruit that turns brown then red.  ( here's a secret for all hot peppers - it is kind of counter intuitive.  The longer you leave it on the plant and the more it ripens - the more heat it loses)  This is "merely" a hot pepper.

 The large pepper on the right side of the picture is a Patriot hybrid.   This is a sweet bell pepper, 4-5" long by 3.5-4.5" wide.,  it is a midseason pepper that ripens from green to red.



This is the Jamaican Gold pepper.  It is a hot, squash pepper - 1.5" tall by 1.75" wide.  It is a prolific ,mid season pepper that matures from green to gold.



Meet the "Masquerade pepper".  It is a hot cluster pepper ( you can see it already has a cluster of peppers) 3" long by 1/2" wide  that goes from green to purple to red.



Here is bouquet, a medium heat, pequin pepper 2/3" long x 1/2" wide, matures from purple to orange to red,





This is gypsy, a sweet Cubanelle frying pepper 4.5" long x 2" wide ranges from pale yellow to orange red.  Definitely a fun pepper to cook with!



Lastly one of my personal favorites- the cowhorn chili.a medium heat anaheim pepper. 6-8" long x 1 1/4" wide  it matures from green to red, but sometimes green to yellow ( no idea why the color change) .  It is a super versatile pepper to cook with.