Chilli and the hippie feel

Or should the title read: I lost that loving feeling?

I stopped writing about chillies almost totally, some time ago, you must have noticed. Not for no reason no, but I got sick of it all loosing the hippie feel. After 4 of my articles about the-race-for-your-best-chilli-or-money, I got dragged through the mud, to say the least. In facebook discussions all the hard data was pulled up in doubt, and questioned. In discussions, I was quoted with comments as being a self-righteous sob or even a bigot as claims that my interpreting of the cold hard numbers were false.
Endless discussion about average heat in records, being average high, and not average mean.
Weird enough I was accused of gaining in some sort of financial way even though I am not in the chilli business, by spreading lies about real numbers that are not mine but from the official institutes like the chili pepper institute in New Mexico.
Smoke and mirrors, as the only ones contesting the cold hard numbers, were commercial growers.

Even though I am in the Netherlands, I started getting calls from the US, from growers telling me the “real” story mostly jabbing about why others should not have had the Guinness worldrecord for the hottest chilli. Point to another, for yourself not to be seen is not good I tell my kids. Divide and conquer, to win in the market?
Low and behold I thought it was an American thing hyping chillies and never getting a record, but a few weeks later a Finland grower started telling he had the next record winning chilli, without showing proof.
Not seen any since my last article about the race months ago.
But, maybe the fight in the market is shushed down for a good few weeks, as Ed Currie has got the new Guinness worldrecord for the hottest chilli with his Carolina Reaper. I would say congrats Ed for your endless work to get it through Guinness.

So I lost the love, for the chilli scene, nothing to do with hippies but just cold hard cash. And don’t tell me that is not true; I read an interview from one of the commercial growers, making about a million US dollars a year.
After getting more and more mails, telling yet another time a different story of what really happened, I got sick of it. I banned every commercial grower that tried to sell me shoe laces for leather belts. I don’t react on any accusation made to my address; I don’t give a rats arse anyway, as I so lost the love.

Sure, some of my old real friends tried to pull me back in the hippie side but every time I say anything about chillies, I start getting this rotting smell up my nose again. Buy this, buy that, we’re better than others and others are better than. . . .
I even have a chilli group on facebook, I started to avoid and when I did drop in, I saw loads of advertisement. No, no, it is just a taste test video naming a certain website a zillion times. . .
Right, and my name is Conny !
Well, first thing I did was toss out the overly pushing their seeds down your throat kind off sellers, then I started to interact a bit again.

At the other hand, I am working my arse off trying to start up a care farm for challenged people, so I don’t have time to interact that much. “De Groeistek” (Eng= place where you can grow) will be a place where we grow heirloom foods, together with our participants giving them the support they need.

When friends got the news where I was working for, I got a load of support, overwhelming and heart warming. Loads of links were shared, and a lot of attention throughout the world. Friends started sending me special chillies, telling me to use the seeds at the farm and make some money from them. Catharina send me loads, Chris Fowler that makes excellent sauce send me a load, Ivor Davies told me he would sponsor the farm with seeds as well. I am starting to feel. . . .

You know, if I could learn to be hard and start promoting on the “I will shove those sees down your throat” kind of way I could really make a buck. I am allowed to put a 150 m3 greenhouse there, I could make more, maybe even. . .
I could make a million too, even with a care farm, if I only start promoting as. . . .

Noo, as I start feeling the love! And, I don’t want to bloody taint it!

Cheers Bart

Taste report: Praetermissum CAP 1144

We all know chili species like the annuum, chinense and baccatum.
But there is much more!
The International Board for Plant Genetic Resources (nowadays part of Bioversity International ) has named more than 20 different wild capsicum species, including the Capsicum Praetermissum we are tasting today.
This wild chili has its origin at the west-coast of south America (Chili, Peru).
The backside of the leaves are a bit hairy but not so much as you've been used of a Pubescens style chilli.

Fruits of the Cap 1144

  

I sow my Praetermissum Cap 1144 for about a year ago. It took a while before it germinated and was not a very big grower. When summer has ended it still didn't grow to be a huge plant.  

I've seen pictures of big Cap 1144 plants but mine remained rather small.

Cap 144 seedling

In the winter it started to flower.

And wow what a beautiful flowers it got! Even when you don't like eating chillies this is a plant you want in your house just to look at!

Cap 1144 flower

After the flowers the berries came and took a few months to ripen.

Now the berries are ripe they fall of the stamp easily. just a little push and there they go.

The fruits of the cap 1144 are very small, thin peel and containing 3 to 10 seeds and some moist.

There is no clear placenta like seen in many cultivated hot peppers.

 2 Euro coin to see the size

Now to the taste:

First impression was a kind of bitter what reminded me of the taste of Pseudocapsicum, a toxic plant grown for its good looks. Yes I did try it before I knew it was toxic, but the bitter taste told me quick enough not to try anymore.

After the bitter a nice bell pepper like sweet, without the sour you find in lots of commercial bell peppers.

A gently, but continuous burn makes it a pleasant chilli to eat.

When the burn is over and the bell pepper taste disappears, a dried tomato like taste takes over.

This dried tomato stays very long, making you to want to eat another chilli.

Nice one to spice up your classical tomato and meatloaf pasta's and also would do good as a taste-maker on potato chips.  But you'll have to do a lot of work cleaning so many little fruits, I wonder if anyone would really use them.

Pseudocapsicum, do not eat them!

But be warned!  Bart ones at a dried Praetermissum CAP 1144 and that was a real bugger!

Aldo

Taste review C. Pubescens "Rocoto Manzano Grande"

Some of you must have gotten tired after reading the title, that name is one mouthful!
The Capsicum pubescens is one of the oddest chilli families there is, I think. The name pubescens means hairy, not that the chillies are, the plant is hairy. These chillies also are called tree chillies, and are known to get over 15 years old, and as big as trees. These pubescens or Rocoto chilli plants are not grown a lot by commercial growers, and that always made me wonder.

Rocoto or pubescens chilli plants are a bit hard to grow, or at least to get them to fruit. As they really are no annual plants, the second year they will do much better. Now that is a bit hard as the can handle a very mild frost a bit, but with our normal winters they will die. So you have to overwinter them in the house. There is a trick to have them carry fruit, and that is to prune them. Cut the end of a branch when it has a good couple of flowers. What is also done, to get the fruits to colour faster, is binding the branches up, so the fruits will get more sun.

Now the plants are odd and beautiful, and some grow to be huge in one year, they start to flower early, but only later on they will get fruits. The flowers are stunning to say the least, purple and purple with white, almost bell like. I have enjoyed growing these plants, for their appearance only, what a stunning plant!
The fruits are odd too, they are huge compared to other chillies and have black seeds. This is stunning, think about a Sambal with black seeds! The burn off the fruit is different too, the heat spreads like thin oil on water, and will be all over your mouth in no time. The burn in these chillies are overall different, and people react on them in a different way. Some say they are much hotter, some say the burn is different, or both.

The structure of the fruit also is different, both in build as in mouth feel. Now as this actually is a taste report, I will get in to the the taste and mouth feel. The skin is less thick and easier to bite through, the flesh is less crunchy and much thicker than any chilli I know. Although the flesh is less crunchy, it isn't unpleasant, and has the mouth feel of a nectarine almost. It is very succulent and moist, and feels fatty when you chew it, even your mouth feels like eating something with fat.

Mind, this is a little one !

Now this one, the Rocoto Manzano Grande or Giant Red Rocoto is not very hot, I almost think it is rather to the mild side. However if you cook with it, it feels like it is getting hotter, weird. The taste is a bit like cucumber, and some paprika, not really sweet. If you want to turn in into a pepper paste, almost everything can be used, if you take the seeds out. The fruit doesn't really have ribs or seedlists, but has walls dividing it, with a sort of heart on top. Everything is soft in it, even the heart. Fresh eaten in a salad, I would suggest using it with some black pepper and some salt, nothing more. Traditionally they are eaten stuffed and boiled, or steamed with the stuffing in it. If you have a hotter version, the traditional way to get them milder is to take the inners out, and fill them with milk. Leave overnight and use the next day. Works like a charm !

To the experts, the red Rocoto's are the least tasty ones, with a few exceptions. So the other Rocoto's coming up are really a step up, or more ! Exciting !

Yours sincerely,

Bart J. Meijer

Wild Chillies, chillies gone wild?

Wild chillies, chillies gone wild?

I have rambled a bit before about rather tasteless chillies.

And in fact, there are more than a few rather tasteless chillies, if you ask me.

Especially if you have been surprised with really good chillies that have a certain herbiness or flavour that amaze you.

Sure there is the difference between water grown chillies "hydrophonies", and the ones that have had a real life in soil. I love organic greens for sure, for they have much more flavour.

So as they are way too expensive for me, I grow them myself now.

In the years, since I moved out with my parents, I learned to cook and appreciate flavours.

My mom was not the best cook mind, so I had to learn from scratch.

Hard in the start, but the best way to learn I’d say.

But having others eat my food, and done more than a few taste sessions for wine, I learned that I have more than just great palate.

Capsicum Eximinum flower.

So I boasted to one of the lads at www.wildchilli.eu that I have great palate and would love to taste wild chillies.

That after I have noticed that none had a description of taste, and nobody did really seemed to know how they tasted. . . .

So I was challenged, and I do have to say I was surprised about the taste.

Really, in the wild chillies you can find the mother of tastes for all chillies and peppers.

First off, I got 3 sorts to taste, and wrote about it in a post.
A question of taste!! The readers loved it, and I loved tasting them.

I got loads of readers there, and got more and more chillies to taste.

Dried berries I had to taste, minute things, with loads of taste that surprised me.

I am picking 2 to describe and will tell you more about others in posts to come.

First off, was one that sounded great, the Capsicum galapagoense.

A species endemic to the Galapagos Islands, doesn’t that sound posh?

First taste is sweet and lovely, and a fruit like..
I would say bell pepper like, without the bitterness?
I loved it, so I licked a little piece from my hand, but it got stuck to my upper lip.
Got just a bit of direct heat but not sure about the taste, so I popped in another with it. . . .
Licked my lips as well, still not feeling any heat.

Definitely sweet bell pepper, the yellow one, even though this berry is red.

Sweet and lovely without the bitterness, I loved it !
The heat started building a bit after the taste faded out, and kept on building.
Not in the nose at all, just tongue and throat
Good grief, I really started sweating, having a real heavy reaction.
My lips started burning hard, and so did my mouth.

My ears even felt like I was going deaf or coming down from high altitude.

They started ringing even.
After 10 minutes the heat was calming down, also on the lips, still sweating though.
I hate this one, for having this fierce afterbite, and yes I am bitten by this one.
This one is weird !
20 minutes now, and the heat is almost gone and I have come to hate this one.

I have had this before with certain chillies, but for the life off me I would not know which one.

Chris Fowler heard of my quest to find the mother of tastes. So he was so kind as to send me a first timer.

He sent me a really fresh wild chilli, a Capsicum Eximium. An end of season fresh, Eximinum, perfectly round about 4 mm, dark red.

I opened it with a knife, and there was only one seed in it.
But this berry was very fleshy, thick skinned, and really looked like a berry.
Not a lot of air or open space, just like a blueberry or fox berry.

So, let’s go, my first fresh wild chilli ever !
I hoped to get some taste with this ini mini berry.
First taste was sweet, and then whammaaa the heat kicked in.
Most of the heat faded really really fast, weird.
As soon as the heat started to vanish ( in seconds really ) my mouth was able to taste.
A crazy sensation of a total overload in tastes, so hard to describe really.
20 or 50 times as much taste as the dried one for sure!

So I was sitting there with this mouth full, or more, with taste from this tiny berry in utter amazement really.
Just mumbling and being amazed, I sat there.
So my wife asks: Are you all-right luv, or are you burning away?
I just nodded.

After 5 minutes the taste slowly died, or I got used to it.

Sweet, fruity like apple maybe, berries, liquorice, almost overblown by the other tastes.

Definitely salt or umami as an after taste, broth like.

The only way I can explain how much taste, and how blown away I was, is this.
If one imagines an astronaut’s pill with everything in it, it is this berry.
In one pill the taste of:
5 apples
a handful of berries,
a small piece of Liquorice,
a pinch of salt
and some meat essence.

Crazy, so much taste!
I will never eat one again for fun, but could imagine me putting just one in a glass of tomato juice ( horrid stuff )
That mini berry, just one, would make tomato juice more than drinkable.

Now, seeds for wild chillies are not widely available.

Then again, I told you about the hippy like share culture amongst chilli lovers.
If you join a forum or a facebook group for chillies, share and re-share.

Do ask; maybe someone loves the wild chilli as much as I do, and shares.

Yours truly,

Bart J. Meijer

Courtesy to Chris Fowler  for the images!