Bhut Jolokia, Down the Hatch!

Yummy yummy yummy, can't wait to do the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion. Yes I have one.

Ok, here's the story,
I've eaten hot peppers since I was a too curious for my own good 8 year old boy visiting his grandparents, wondering just how hot is the homegrown cayenne Grandpa was eating in his omellette. Grandpa gave me an omellete like his, only with a green pepper (not nearly as hot) and I was in love. I thought I was eating fire. Eventually, I graduated to red cayennes, and they are still to this day, my favorite pepper of all time. They just taste nice. When I was in college I discovered habeneros. The first one I ever ate, actually put me in shock. It was a pale yellow/green color, about like a banana pepper, and I was in a "Crazy enough to try anything twice!" kind of mood. I have since grown to love habs, and wanted to stretch out my pepper handling ability. A buddy from church also loves hot chilis and he gave me a bag full of his own home grown bhut jolokias and trnidad moruga scorpions (TMS).
So far, the bhut I ate in that video was the hottest pepper I've ever eaten. It was tasty too. I was glad that I got to taste the pepper pretty good before the heat hit. That's my one complaint with Habs, they taste great, but the heat seems to hit before the tasting is done. Take a hab, de-seed and take the placental bits out (That's the ribs where the seeds attach), being careful to not touch the knife or bits you are removing out to the inside fleshy bit of the pepper to see what I mean. taste the hab. Roasted habenero really BELONGS in some foods.
I could see having some fun with the bhut. Bhut curry powder immediately comes to mind. I can't help but think that would be a "Good Thing". The Gravy also sent me a nice recipe for hummus that incorporates bhuts, TMS, and one lonely habenero. I'll post that recipe when I post a video of me eating the TMS.

73,
GB Hoyt

July Garden Update

Man!
It's already July. I haven't done a garden update since waaaaaay long ago, so let me get you the skinny.
First of all, let me say that my particular location in "Urban Polk county" doesn't quite get the sunshine it needs to grow plants from seed I think. Every great looking tomato plant I sprouted when last I blogged about gardens damped off when the plants got about 6-9 inches tall.
There's probably a way to get around all that business, but I haven't figured it out yet.
My eggplants and cayennes all damped off too.
I did manage to get my heirloom Brandywine tomato vine to gimp along during the winter though, it didn't die till June, and probably could have gone longer, but it was growing in the compost heap, and it was time to work some compost, so it was sacrificed. The compost heap also produced an EXECELLENT! crop of cherry tomatoes from some volunteers. I couldn't believe it! There they were growing in the compost heap...
Anyway, interesting things are happening in the ol' heap. Mainly, it's getting me some GREAT compost. Every where I spread the stuff, good things start to happen. I let it get real hot mid May/June, making sure I turned it over nice and often. I had a plan for using it.
Because I can't seem to start tomatoes from seed in this location, I decided to go ahead an Grab a couple of plants at the beginning of June to plant and see what happens. I went to the local Blue themed hardware store, got some heirloom "Red Beefsteak" tomatoes, a couple of cages, and some high test dirt to make my own custom blend.
Earlier this year, I split a white barrell I saved for making a pair of potato containers, and I decided that Tomato sounded enough like potato to be grown inside them instead. I filled the bottom half with some compost from the heap, and mixed my magic dirt up, and put it on top. My idea is that the compost would provide some micronutrients, organic matter, and a moisture sponge for the growing soil to rest on. Think of it as a firm bedrock. I sunk the plants into the top of the containers and they barely reached the top of the second wire of the tomato cage. The bottom wire was at or near the soil level.
Here's how they look now:

Number 1

Number 2

We'll see if they make it out of the summer alive!

I gave them some Epsom salt this morning because the bottom looked like it was starting to yellow. Usually, this has something to do with a magnesium deficiency and Epsom salt gives the plant magnesium.

Blossoming hope for the future!

That isn't the big news though, on Sunday past, I received three plants that could change my chili perception forever!

Three Little Birds

They are Bhut Jolokias, volunteers from a FOAF, so they are in a sense, Living Urban Legends! heh!

Somehow, that seems appropriate for a plant with a name like "Ghost Chili"
 I separated the plants today, and gave them a magnesium drink too. They seemed to like it. They'll be ready to go into a container in about a week. They've just been dug up, and I want the roots to show some vigor before I try to transplant them again.

Sittin' by my Doorstep

I hope they make!
I'm going to try and find some more info on the parent plants.
Tew Be Continued.
I have further compost volunteer adventure stories to tell, complete with SCIENCE!

The "Half Mexican"

I built an omelette today, inspired by quesadillas and enchilladas. I used no tomatoes, no cilantro, and no bell peppers, so it's only half mexican. I did use sour cream, 'mexican Cheese', and a habanero. The more I eat habaneros the more I realize that I haven't been giving this pepper a fair shake. On this particular go round, I noticed a distinctly sweet characteristic to the spicy suckers. Right before the heat hits you you taste something nice. I think that's the way it's supposed to be. I may start using habaneros in everything, sneaking them into dishes. Cook them a little bit, they won't be so hot.
Here's the recipe rundown:

One pinch each of fresh:
thyme
oregano
sage
basil

and then:
1 Tbsp Sour Cream
1/4 cup shredded 'Mexican Cheese'
3 eggs
1 habanero
1tsp butter

Clarify the butter, cut the habanero into thin strips, and discard the seeds (or save them for the interior of the omelette, if you are a little bold!). Saute the habanero in the butter. Beat the eggs, add to the pan. When the eggs firm up, add sour cream, cheese, sage, oregano and thyme. Shortly before folding the omelette, add the basil. Garnish with a little bit of basil/sage held in reserve, and a dash of Tiger Sauce to give it that last little bit of something. Enjoy!

Omelette, ready for consumption.
In the pic you can see one big chunk o' sauted habanero that I didn't cut thinly. Guess what my first bite was :)

Gardening in a Box.

Normally, I do things a little outside the box. This time, outside the box is inside the box!
HA!

I love getting my hands dirty in good soil. I also love reminding myself of the simple truth: "If I want to live, something else must die."
That's some hard philosophy for you, and it's not what this post is about. This post is about gardening using a technique I have modified from "Square Foot Gardening" . I bought the newest book at a big box hardware store so I could start raising the food I eat instead of just going to the store. Previous attempts at gardening have only been minimally effective, I wanted to try and do something good and right, and I'm finally starting to see fruit, literally, and figuratively!

I don't wish to critique Mel Bartholomew's book Square Foot Gardening because I didn't follow his instructions exactly. I didn't build the soil he said to build (and I don't think I will), and I used slightly different materials. I didn't do anything different out of spite, or because I thought I was doing it better, I did it because I've learned to be pragmatic, especially when time is of the essence. I was already late in getting the boxes built, I feared I might become downright hasty if I neglected doing something beneficial soon! I'm glad I did things when I did them, I was able to learn some valuable lessons:
1. The thing about a raised box garden is that the magic is in the raised box! I believe that is the single most important thing I learned. Building a box, covering the bottom with a weed fabric, and controlling the soil you use to grow your plants are the things that seem to provide the greatest results. Isolate the environment to compensate for a lack.
2. Watch it like a hawk. Because your environment is isolated, you may have to make a quick reaction to what's happening in and around the soil, especially when it comes to water. When you have a raised bed, with weed fabric accross the bottom, it's hard to water too much, but it can be very easy to water too little, especially as it gets hotter. plants can't develop deep roots, so you have to compensate.
3. Have a plant support system established before you build the boxes. One of the things Mel says do, that I didn't was build a netting trellis. I couldn't find the netting, and instead of pragmatically just getting some tomato cages or stakes, I neglected to do that, and the plants quickly went willy-nilly. Bad call. I finally staked the tomatoes today, and got them off the everything. My tomato production will probably suffer as a result.

Other general notes include, the next time I do tomatoes, i will do one variety at a time, just to keep seeds pure. I will also locate some netting, because I think I could get better tomatos if I'd been training to to grow on a net instead of just staking them, staking will damage the vine. I'll do fewer plants too. Ultimately, I'd like to have a group of cherry tomatoes growing overhead. I think I could do that, and have it be awesome.

The garden is beginning to bear fruit. it's gone from this:

To This:

The tomatoes are producing tomatoes, although none have turned yet. The cucumbers are going strong, we've already had one. I've gotten basil, rosemary, sage, thyme, oregano, radishes, and various greens. I've also had a hand full of blackberries.

updates as summer and harvest progresses!

Spicy Sunrise, Done Right!

This is spicy done right!

Cayenne Peppers. Fresh picked, ready to ride.

Today's omelette is called, "The Sunrise" because it's the perfect way to start your day. It's got kick enough to get you moving, and is filled with cheesy beefy herby goodness to keep you eating it.
Ingredients:
2 Eggs
Louisiana Hot Sauce (the Brand you will need more than one drop!)
Sliced roast beef
Slice of American Cheese
Fresh oregano
Fresh thyme
Fresh rosemary
Fresh Cayenne peppers.

Here's some of the ingredients ready to go:


Beat the eggs with the hot sauce, you can add a lot of hot sauce to the eggs because the heat will break down the hotness, and leave the flavor. You want to use maybe add a pinch of Tony's (you oughta know what that is :) ) Warm and butter your skillet up, add eggs, wait for them to firm up, add cheese first, then roast beef, then herbs. Finally you can add chopped cayenne to the mix, to your taste for heat. Something like this should be the result:



Mine is cayenne mustached as a tribute to the matador who has conquered the bull, and placed him in the omelette!

Flavor wise, this omelette's strongest characteristic is the flavor of the hot sauce and the heat of the fresh peppers. The flavor of the hot sauce intensifies in the cooking process while the heat from it mellows. I add the cayenne pepper for spice not only because they are spicy, but because the cayenne is the base pepper for Louisiana hot sauce. The 'other' famous hot sauce from Louisiana, Tabasco is made from tabasco peppers. Tabascos are nice peppers, and plenty spicy, but they have a noticeably different taste than the cayennes. Cayennes to me have always had a bell-pepper like crispness to them, mainly because they are a cultivar of Capsicum Annuum as are bell peppers, and tabasco peppers are Capsicum frutescen in heritage. Sometimes the flavor of frutescens variety peppers is described as 'fruity'. Tabascos are less fruity to me than thai's but they have their own character. My dad grows them, perhaps he have input. I like them, especially fresh, or in Asian food, but cayennes are by far, my favorite pepper.

Enjoy!

Fresh Herbs and Hot Peppers Make Me Smile

"Take the Train to Happy Town!" W00T! W00T!

Above you you see my latest adventures in both omelettes and the absurd. in that bowl are today's featured ingredients, A habenero, a serrano, and a cayenne, it's like some joke wrapped in an eggy blanket.

or a dare.

I love the spicy things, and today's omelette was a little spicy. It was also a little sloppy, and cooked too fast. I put too many mushrooms in it. Too fast, too spicy, too much filling. All about extremes today. Take a look:


I couldn't even get it folded over. Here's the ingredients:

sliced habenero chilli with the seeds removed.
sliced serrano chilli with the seeds removed.
chopped green cayenne with the seeds intact.
sliced bell pepper
sliced mushrooms
swiss cheese
garden fresh sage and rosemary.
garlic (browned in butter before adding eggs.)

I wanted to make a skull and crossbones garnish out of the mushroom and bellpepper, but the overall sloppiness of the omelette takes away from that.
To summarize, last week's omelette was perfect, this week's omelette is spicy. It's a dare.
I can do better.
I can make spicy and perfect.
Do you have a spicy food story? One where you were surprised by spicy?

Lame attempt at Skull-n-bones:

Strange Daze...

It's a rainy day, so God is doing the work of wetting my garden, I did have to turn the compost today though, and did so in a light rain. No biggie, I still worked up a sweat, and was amazed at how warm the heap was. Composting works! When it gets ready, it will probably go in the front yard, around my landscaping, mainly because this compost is questionable, i keep finding grubs in it even though it's warm. I don't want to add problems to my garden, I already don't get enough sunlight for my taste. Why add grubs!
My garden is a square foot garden, although I admit the pepper plant is in a container, and is likely to remain in a container. My goal is to see how big I can get this cayenne, and how long it can survive. I would like to plant seeds from this cayenne though, I have three set aside, from my first red pepper, and look forward to planting them. Even though the plant was in only moderate sun, the pepper did turn out to be good and spicy! perhaps there's something to the old grape growers tale that struggle makes for good grapes.

On a side note, handling a shovel on a daily basis is reducing the wimpyness of my information service oriented palms. I almost got a blister!

Peppers!

So I found a package of Cayenne seeds left over from two years ago, the last time I seriously tried to start a garden. They were an heirloom variety, and pretty spicy from what the package claimed at least. At some point last fall I said "what the heck!" and planted them in a yogurt cup. I figured if anything, I will grow a small pepper plant in a small pot over the winter, and it will be fun. I put the pepper in the windowsill, and watered it. It bloomed, but it was cool enough all winter that the blooms fell off, and the pepper slowly grew. Finally, in February, the blooms set fruit! I had tiny cayennes on my bush, even though the bush was growing in a yogurt cup. I started taking pictures when the pepper started turning red, mostly to upset my yankee cousins who are still experiencing the thralls of winter, whatever winter is.... (side note, Florida has four seasons: They are Dry, Rainy, Summer, and Hurricane, in that order.)

So I now present to you a complete timeline of my amazing over winter cayenne pepper goodness. This morning I ate it.





Omlette ingredients include: 2 eggs, splash whole milk, two chopped cayenne peppers (one red, one green), salt, cheese, 1 clove sliced garlic, and sage.