Thursday, February 19, 2015

Homestead Update

Hot Pepper Challenge

Mr. Marvelous enjoys growing hot peppers.  He is not a hot pepper afficianado, he simply enjoys growing them, giving them away and watching other peoples' faces turn bright red.  He also like the bragging rights.

Two years ago he successfully grew some Habenero peppers and some Scotch Bonnet peppers.  Our brother in law and his sons have an alarming tolerance for hot peppers.  These peppers brought tears  and sent them gasping for BREAD!  AND BUTTER!!  AND MILK!!!.  The heat of chili peppers is measured in Scoville Units (Wikipedia has a fascinating discussion about that here).  Jalapeno Peppers have a Scoville rating of a measly 1,000-4,000 units.  Serrano Peppers are between a mere 10,000 and 23,000 units.  Habanero, Scotch Bonnet, and Datil peppers range from a more respectable 100,000 to 350,000 units.  Are you getting the picture of how hot this stuff is?

Well it is not hot enough for Mr. Marvelous.  Oh no.  This year we are going off the charts.  He has ordered ~ and received ~ a new breed of pepper seed to plant for this year.  This year he is going to try and grow the Carolina Reaper pepper.  How much hotter is it, you ask?  The Carolina Reaper is rated at 2,200,000 units on the Scoville Scale.  Did you catch all those zeroes?  That is two million two hundred thousand.  It has been recognized by the Guiness Book of World Records as the World's Hottest Pepper.  I won't be handling these, in case you were wondering.  No Sir.  Not even with gloves on. If you are a hot pepper person you can find the seeds here.

We have learned over the years of growing hot peppers, that the hotter and drier the summer, the hotter the peppers.  So if we have a normal-for-Alabama-summer, and if you see Mr. Marvelous walking toward you in August with his hand behind his back and a grin on his face; if you hear him saying, "Come on, be a man!", RUN!  Run for your life!!

http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0220/1512/products/PuckerButt_Pepper_Company_Smokin_Eds_Carolina_Reaper_1024x1024.jpg?v=1392819925

I'll let you know how it turns out.

1 comment:

Clark said...

awesome, and your brother in law is thankful.