Chillis!

[Crundy]

Horaay! I picked off the first of the ripe chillis from my Scotch Bonnet plant today:



The only problem is that they always all seem to ripen at the same time. About 4 more are almost ripe already. There's only so much hot food a person can eat!

[Victoria26]

Hey they look fab!

Can't you pickle them or dry them out?

I dried all my chillis out last year after a bumper crop. Stock them in a food processor and chopped them up real small and have used them all year. I am JUST about finished them so it works out well for my chilli plants this year!

[Duronal]

WOW! what and earth did you do to get your plant to produce this early in the year?!

[BarleySugar]

I thought mine were doing well from this year's sowings, with flowers open on Numex Twilight and Purple Jalapeno. Did you start yours from seed this year, or were they overwintered?

[Helen Johnson]

Wow! They look really good! You can thread them onto a bit of cotton to dry,(thread through the stalk) and hang them in the kitchen somewhere. They'll look really jolly!!

[Crundy]

I had the plant from last year and just kept it on the windowsill. Lots of food and a few prunings to stop it branching too much. It seems to have 'flushes' of flowers, and so I just, ahem, you know, get freaky with them and a bit of string, and hey presto, chillis all year round. My other chilli plant (unknown species) has just ripened up a few as well, although one is a bit of a mutant (I'll post a photo).

I'll think of something to do with them

[cupcake]

I freeze alot of mine, just put them in a plastic tupperware type container. You do have to chop them up as you get them out or they tend to go quite soft. I think this year I will remove the stalk before I freeze. Also string them up, or you could preserve in vinegar, and if you really like all things chilli, you can flavour vodka with one! The great thing is, you have to keep tasting it to see that it's not getting too hot

Great looking chillis!

[Llamas]

Oh neato! What lookers! My boyfriend and I have been doing the same with our chilli bush, -pruning and freaky string thing- for three years. We've now got a sort of chilli bonsai which is slowly beguinning to dominate the windowsill, again.

[RobintheBobin]

Like Helen I thread mine onto good sturdy cotton - I gave them away to people as pressies and they all have them decorating their kitchens Thread through the stalk so you can snip off a chilli whenever you need one.

[golden14]

They look great! I have some 'in progress' at the minute. Some 100 odd plants as I got a bit carried away...Plan on selling the ones I can't store, or might make up some chilli sauce and resell it.

[womble]

100 plants! Blimey, thought I was bad with about 30.

[maytreefrannie]

I kept a pepper plant indoors overwinter, fed it at intervals, pruned it - and all I have so far is a stick.

Congratulations and well done. Enjoy.