Going to try chillies next year

[Scarlet]

I’m a lemon drop fan. Good heat, large crop per plant and lovely taste. Pretty easy to grow too.

[Greenleaves]

I like spicey food but a right whimp when in comes to heat from chillies, want something that doesn't overpower everything else

[Mitzi]

Go for something hot! No point growing chillies if there's no heat imho. I've not grown them myself (yet?) but Orange Habs (Habanero) grow and crop well in this country, I believe. Scotch bonnets are plenty hot enough for most people, but not superhot, so that's another alternative. Either of these would be best grown in a greenhouse or polytunnel unless we have another hot summer like this year.

Believe it or not, I haven't grown Lemon Drop myself either but like everyone else says, it's a really good do'er and a very usable heat and flavour. They will be fine outside once the weather warms up.

[Kirk]

Was going to suggest the same as Scarlet, Lemon Drop.
I bought mine as a plant from a Last Satrurday of the month market and this year a good supply of chillies. All a nice lemon colour - what else?

Reasonable heat and easy. Will have to prune it back a bit before bringing it indoors, and that will be soon.

You could find a chilli you like and use the seed from that but depends on the potential cross pollination.

[Bluenowhere]

I grew yellow biquinho not too hot and I’d rate it in the taste department. Orange Hab much hotter but if you don’t use too much it adds a tangy taste rather than overpowering heat. I’d grow both again.

Think I’m going to add lemon drop to my list next year as it always seems to be recommended on here.

[Philthy]

I'd definitely endorse Lemon Drop; it's an excellent choice - a great plant with natural vigour, cold tolerance (not hardy as such but it's unfazed by cooler conditions that would cause the likes of habanero or moruga to sulk), and prolific cropper. Put in a roomy pot, provide support and it should romp away. Agreed, it'd manage outside, but it'd do better in a GH. Fruits wise it's probably one of the best all rounders out there, with genuine citrus aroma and taste, not too hot (on a par with cayenne peppers). Rated especially for fish and chicken, but really they go well in just about everything. I regularly give a bag to a friend of mine who loves putting them in honey to give it a bit of zing. Use them in baking, biscuits cakes and the like, if a recipe calls for lemon zest try using grated lemon drop chilli (according to taste of course).
Jalapeno (mild heat), and Cayenne (medium heat), are very common, the ones that pretty much everybody has heard of. They're justly popular though, being easy to grow, good early croppers, and good all rounders in the kitchen. Both are available in purple variants if you want added visual interest (red is the fully ripe colour).
Cheyenne is supposed to be a good choice (similar heat to Cayenne), this one is a dwarf cultivar, compact but still a heavy cropper, good for pots if you're short on space, and is rated for outside patio spaces too. Fruits are orange with apparently decent flavour.
Super (similar heat to Cayenne) and Apache F1 (slightly hotter), should also do well outdoors. Both plants share traits of being compact and ideally suited to container growing, while their fruits are quite similar in size and shape.

Be careful when shopping around in future (these won't be your only plants ), the given heat ratings can be a bit general as they're meant to help differentiate one group of pepper from another e.g. Jalapenos vs Scotch Bonnets. But the strains within each group can vary wildly e.g. Habanero is given a general rating of 100,000-350,000 SHU, but specific habanero strains such as Chocolate or Red Savina can hit 600,000 on the scale. In other words check the small print when you buy seeds to be sure you are still within your comfort zone heat wise

[Philthy]

I'd also add that there's a number of varieties out there that do look stunning as ornamental plants; I've grown Black Pearl on numerous occasions just because I love the look of it (dark purple to black leaves and stems, sometimes a bit of mottled green, while the clusters of chillies start black and ripen to a deep red). I've never been tempted to harvest and use the pods, though no reason why you couldn't.
There's a few I'm hoping to try next season bought just on visual merit; Shu, Purple Flash, are a couple of them.


PS nice to know there are fellow milk haters on this forum

[bramble]

I would suggest Hungarian Hot Wax..little or no heat but Still a chilli pepper.
Good crop of pointy peppers going from green to yellow.

[Greenleaves]

Thanks for all the suggestions

[mothhawk]

I've just found this site that gives a good selection of "cool" chillies.

They have divided their range into hot, medium, and cool chillies. Brilliant idea for us chilli virgins