It's Chilli Harvesting Time!

Home & Garden Discussion and Questions
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#1

Long story short, downsized dramatically a few years ago. Part of that process was reducing my gardening from ‘lots’ to ‘practically nothing in small pots’ due to health factors as well as space. Throughout all of this, I could not let go of a few things, unfortunately, most of the plants, mostly herbs which I have always grown, and which I tried so hard to keep, simply couldn’t survive in the new conditions.

My chillies seem to love it here though, so I kept them in pots and added a few new varieties as time and space allowed.

Habanero with Aji Limon Chilli PlantsG
Habanero with Aji Limon Chilli PlantsG488×650 166 KB

I have 1 x Habanero that is supposed to be Orange, but seems to have turned red, but given there’s at least 2 plants in the pot, maybe one of them is a red one.

There’s also another pot with a special Aji Limon, a Peruvian chilli with a sweet and tangy flavour, with not a lot of heat. It’s a treasure, with a delightful flavour of it’s own. I’m going to try to grow more of them, I just have to get the motivation to plant the seeds. That’s Parsley that has gone to seed in the lower reached of the tall (Aji Limon) pot. I will save the seed and plant again.

The Broom chilli, which lives in a different area, is finally fruiting with the tiniest fruit, so I’m waiting to see how that develops, it’s an Australian variety, and I’ve been waiting for it to produce for 2 years now. So yay! hoping it continues to do well.

Habanero with Aji Limon ChilliesG

This week I have harvested 1 or 2 chillies per day. Today, the special Aji Limon had 3 ripe and ready to pick. The Habanero had another 3 over yesterday and today, which adds to the other 3 from last week.

I deseed, chop and freeze them in lots of 3 per bag for use through out the year.

My homegrown Chillies brighten my days with their produce, and then with the eating of whatever they get made into for meals!

6 Likes
#2

A coworker gave me chocolate scorpion peppers he’d grown that were unbearable spicy for him. He’s from Egypt & used to very spicy foods so that’s really saying something. My partner made a sauce with those, habaneros & sweet bell peppers, I brought a jar to work for all the heat-lovers in the office. Everybody loves it but nobody can tolerate more than a couple drops at a time!

2 Likes
#3

Oh my! I know I couldn’t bear the Scorpion Chillies! The flavour mixed with all those others would be lovely, but the heat …
I know my limits! :rofl:

#4

To have a garden… I’m wistful and a little jealous. I have the brownest thumb of all time.

1 Like
#5

@Bunny1kenobi Sometimes it truly isn’t you, it’s the area, the surroundings, the conditions.

I can grow things in desert conditions, and have done so, not so well as in more advantageous situations, but still, it’s been done.

At this new unit there’s little space even for pots, no usable garden space, exposed to extreme sunlight and high temperatures, high fences, chemical garden sprays on three sides that comes through the fences, plus the insect spraying that’s done here yearly, and I can grow very little in my containers.

It’s very frustrating and I miss my old gardens … I understand your feelings. :cry:

The chillies along with a long lived Bay Laurel tree in a container, and some ordinary Sorrel and Italian Parsley are the only food related plants I can keep alive. Even the Spearmint died - mint is usually an invasive weed!

There’s only 1 spot inside that is consistently favourable to plants staying alive, and that’s in a corner of my bedroom where the Parlour Palms live.
I may try to grow some herbs there, just because!

#6

I love your peppers! They were one of my favorite things to grow…jealous of your Aji Limon!

One Drive sends me daily look back pictures which are mostly pictures of my previous garden in PA. We had 10 acres so I had plenty of room to grow all sorts of flowers and veggies. We rent now so my garden is very limited.

I hope this spring, you will share your plantings. I have about ten huge pots that sit empty as I have no energy to plant … I want to plant some herbs and peppers. Are peppers easily grown from seed? I have only planted the already growing plants from the garden center, so there is little variety.

lol Cilantro seems to be the only herb that grows without my attention. I did grow parsley for the butterflies and did see Monarch caterpillars eating away!

2 Likes
#7

The Aji Limon did take a lot of care to get growing, and I saved seed from the first crop last year but have not yet planted them. I really need to! It should be too hot to grow them here but they do fine throughout the winter.
We are in full summer here at the moment and it’s extremely hot lately, with dry winds, so any soft leaved things get burnt from the sun and wind.

I find the chillis easy to grow in pots. I’ve had them potted for some years. But have not had much luck with Bell Pepper in pots, they seem to need more area for roots.

I have always planted 3 seeds per 1 plant expected to grow,(1 to die, 1 for the ants, 1 to grow sort of thing) and if the others grow as well, then that’s good too, depending on space and expected size of plant. I find it so hard to cull extra seedlings, 'cos they grew y’know, they have to have a chance! :rofl:

Herbs are good to grow, and use in the kitchen. I miss what i used to be able to grow.
I prefer to grow from seed, perhaps that comes from my early years of being raised on a dairy farm and growing our own produce, saving seed etc from year to year.
Heritage seeds are preferable, that way seed can be saved from year to year.

Perhaps you could do what I’ve been trying to manage to get my extra chilli seeds in; do one little bit of the whole project each time you can, whether it’s a couple of things a day, or a week.
I bought some potting mix and Basil seeds with my last hardware store delivery order, and plan to plant them and the chilli seeds this week if possible.

I have the potting mix soaking in water to expand so it’s ready for me to top up the pots and plant the seeds in when I have enough energy to do that.

I’ll see if I can post some images as I do it, that might be motivation for both of us to keep on keeping on. :heart:

2 Likes
#8

Personally, I cannot take the heat from habañero chilies. One time my husband and I went out to a hot wing place and he ordered his with mango habañero sauce. I took one tiny bite and thought it wasn’t so bad, which it wasn’t…until right after I swallowed. It was so hot, it made me feel physically ill. I’m all for a little heat, but there’s heat and then there’s fire, lol.

It must be nice to enjoy the welcoming brightness of your gardening corner! How can you tell that the habañeros are ripe and ready?

Have you considered getting an AeroGarden to expand your garden to the inside of your home? It would give you a chance to protect from all those negative elements your outdoor garden is running up against. Here’s a link to a previous AeroGarden discussion on the site.

1 Like
#9

When I had an allotment, we had a similar mantra, but our baddie was slugs. (Even typing that creeps me out, I have a bit of a phobia of the blasted creatures)

2 Likes
#10

@AudiobookLover Yeah, I hear you about how the heat of chillies can affect a person! There’s a heat level I can deal with, and no further. So much so that I removed the Red Habaneros, which were wonderful producers, from their pots last year and discarded them. I find it difficult to discard growing plants, but, in this case, if they can’t be used, they’re taking up space I could plant something I could use, in.

I’ve learnt that there is an … odour … that too hot habaneros give off when sliced that indicates their heat and flavour will not be something I like and can eat. It’s a dirty sort of smell, and taste too. I prefer a brighter, lighter flavour.

For me, the habaneros are ready when they are completely coloured, whatever their colour is meant to be, in this case orange or red. Unripe peppers of any kind contain a substance that I react badly to, and thus avoid. They need several hours of full sunlight per day to ripen properly.

The Aji Limon are ripe when they turn yellowish to orangish - there were 3 more ripe this morning!

thanks for the suggestion. I did look into it in the first year I was here, when everything began to die off etc. There are a few reasons I didn’t go there, the main one being that there really is no space in the unit for one to remain safely in place anywhere near to a water source, or a power point (power socket) and cords running across floors are too dangerous to contemplate.
I did look at hydroponic types of growing arrangements from time to time, however, the flavour of much of the hydroponically grown stuff I used to buy from supermarkets is gross to me, so that’s not a path I want to go down.

I find I am unable to subject myself to the very real potential of overwhelming disappointment anymore, so avoid spending on products that once researched carefully, don’t hold up well to what I want from them.
Given the deterioration of health and physical abilities, I’m enjoying the remains of what I have, and can manage, and am really trying to work on reducing the number of things I have to care for etc.

@Renstar Oh, slugs - slugs are evil. I think I cried the last time my seedlings were eaten by the slugs here. There is an overabundance of slugs and snails here due to the overgrown shrubs etc over the fences. I see their trails running across the bark ground cover stuff, and across the artificial turf most days. But, they consume mould, so they have a good use too! At least I tell myself that.