of laser line were snaked around and among the transplants and held in place with ground staples.
We had a cool but sunny May and early June, and the peppers were off to a slow start. Once the soil finally warmed up in mid-June, we applied a few inches of compost for a mulch, and in the heat most of the peppers finally took off. The peppers that lagged behind were some of the sweet bells. By mid-August, I had plenty of green jalapeños, serranos, and ‘Anaheims’ and a few ‘North Star’ and ‘Yolo Wonder’ green bells to harvest, but it wasn’t until mid-September that the bulk of the peppers started to really produce. And produce they did.
I wouldn’t say I had a great harvest, but I had all the peppers I could possibly use and then some. Twenty-seven plants produced baskets and baskets of peppers, and the harvest lasted through October. Most of the bells were used in salads, peperonata, on the grill, and in numerous soups and stews. A lot were also shared with friends, family, and the local food bank. The very hot peppers—‘Tepin,’ ‘D’Arbol,’ and ‘Thai Hot’—produce lots of peppers, and a little goes a long way. Most of these, and all the different paprika peppers, I dried in my dehydrator to be enjoyed as seasoning throughout the year. To keep them safe from the pantry meal moths that I had in abundance (I found out later that there are pheromone traps that control these kitchen pests), I put the whole dried peppers in plastic freezer bags, labeled them, and put them in the freezer. I had planted six ‘Anaheim’ and two pimientos, and they produced four big grocery-store bags full of peppers over a six-week period. My daughter-in-law Julie and I spent hours every weekend roasting, peeling, and cutting them into strips so that they could be frozen in freezer bags. Although we said at the time that we would probably never use them all, both of us ran out of them by June. (We both got spoiled because all winter long we were able to make a great meal quickly; from roasted pepper soup for Christmas to a lunch of bean burritos; all we needed to do was reach in the freezer.)
Bell peppers, paprikas, and lots of New Mexico types and hot chili varieties filled my harvest baskets from late August to late October.
As we pulled the plants out in late fall, I analyzed their health and how the individual varieties had performed and tasted. I came to the conclusion that most of the bell pepper plants looked sparse and didn’t produce as they should have (not that we needed any more), and none looked as vigorous as the many chilies. Further, some of their lower leaves were very pale. In my experience, that means not enough nitrogen, and while all the books I’d read said not to feed them heavily, the next time I planned to give them more nitrogen. For grilling, I most liked the flavor of the anchos and pimientos, but I was disappointed in the productivity and flavor of the purple bells—when I served them in their unripe purple stage, they tasted like green bell peppers. The biggest surprise was the flavor of the ‘Almapaprika’ pepper; it was sweet, hot, and the essence of pepper. This thick-walled, slightly hot pepper was bred in Hungary for eating fresh, and it tastes terrific that way, but I also dried it for the spice paprika. Because of its thick flesh, it had to be cut in thin slices and dried in a dehydrator, and when it was ground it tended to clump, but who cared, what flavor!
The 1998 Pepper Garden
The 1990 pepper garden was so much fun, I decided to grow another, but this time in a whole new space out by the street because the soil in the driveway beds had become contaminated with nematodes (tiny parasitic critters that invade a plant’s root system and stunt their growth), to which most peppers are susceptible. The drainage was poor in the beds along the street, so I had wooden planters built and a commercial soil mix delivered to fill them. Fortunately, a friend was visiting at the time who is a soil-consultant, and when I told him I usually had problems when I imported soil, he offered to test it. (When you purchase soil from garden supply houses, you seldom know the quality because it depends on where the soil was dug and what was mixed into it.) The analysis showed that the new soil was extremely high in sulfur and boron and practically off the chart in potassium. On the good side, the pH was 7.5, and the soil was high in organic matter and nitrogen. You can see that if I’d had no soil test and added a standard balanced fertilizer, I would have added even more potassium and nitrogen, and my peppers would have been stunted or would not have bloomed because of the excess nitrogen. My soil guru prescribed a specific amount of limestone to lower the potassium and tie up excess boron. We added the amendment and mixed it in and added no other fertilizers.
It was the year of El Nino and that spring we had record-breaking rain—including thirty days of rain in a row for a total of 40 inches—unheard of in our arid climate, which averages 15 inches a year. Needless to say, it was a bad spring for getting peppers off to a good start, and I lost 90 percent of my seedlings—all but a few ‘Golden Cayennes’ and ‘Figaros.’ I had started the peppers in February as usual, and by April they were big enough to be transplanted to one-gallon containers and moved outside. There, they languished for six more weeks in cold wet weather. (Next year, I get a cold frame.) By the time we were able to plant in mid-June, most of the peppers either had succumbed or looked too pathetic to plant! I decided to abandon my pepper project. But then a trip to a few nurseries yielded a surprising number of interesting pepper varieties. Counting a lovely unnamed yellow ornamental pepper that I purchased at midsummer in a florist’s shop, I ended up with one plant each of seventeen varieties and two plants each of the cherries, ‘Figaros,’ and ‘Golden Bells.’
My 1998 pepper garden was created in raised beds out at the street and welcomed all who visited. The driveway beds I had used before were planted with marigolds to control a nematode infestation. The rest of the yard was filled with vegetables and herbs.
The raised beds along the street (above), were filled with peppers. The varieties growing in the bed include ‘Figaro’ pimento, ‘Hungarian Wax,’ ‘Italian Long,’ ‘Thai Hot,’ ‘Golden Bell,’ and an unnamed yellow ornamental pepper growing in a container. Two easily grown bell peppers, ‘Gypsy’ and ‘Cal Wonder,’ (below) grow in another bed.
There is considerable evidence that marigolds of all types help deter nematodes. And because most varieties of peppers are quite prone to nematodes, we interplanted the peppers with dwarf marigolds to be cautious. (The driveway beds were also planted with twelve different varieties of marigolds.) When we pulled the gardens out in the fall, there was no nematode damage on the pepper roots (nematodes cause knotlike swellings on the roots and generally deform them) and the driveway beds seemed clear as well.
Considering the very late start in planting the peppers and the questionable soil mix, the pepper garden did well. It produced baskets full of peppers, again far more than we could use. The stars this season were the sweet ‘Figaro’ pimientos; the ‘Golden Bells,’ which were enormous, sweet, and plentiful; the big, juicy, and flavorful ‘Jalapeño Frienza’; and the cherry peppers. The cherries were new to me, and I really enjoyed them pickled and stuffed for “shooters” (see page 78). I missed being able to roast our usual poblanos and ‘Anaheims’ from seasons past; and we still don’t fully appreciate habanero peppers because they’re too hot! All things considered, though, the peppers really came through, the harvest was delightful, and it was such a beautiful garden, cars would slow down to check it out. Who says you can’t landscape with veggies?
1990 Pepper Garden: Twenty-Three Varieties
Sweet Peppers
‘Big Red’
‘Chocolate Bell’
‘Culinar’
‘Golden
