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Chili Peppers
Columbus was looking for a shorter route to the countries of Asia that produced valuable spices like
black pepper, but he bumped into North and South America along the way. When Columbus landed in the New
World, he and his immediate followers stuck an erroneous and confusing moniker on the local grown hot
chiles. He named them "peppers" because they spiced up the bland food he and his sailors had been eating
just the way black pepper did. It took about two centuries for botanists to figure out that chile
peppers belong to the genus Capsicum, a totally different botanical family than black peppers.
To clear up one other confusing matter, you'll note that I spell chile with an e at the end, not an i.
Chili is the name of a stew with meat, and sometimes beans. It is only related to chiles by the fact
that some chili versions contain copious amounts of hot peppers.
Chile peppers, in the few centuries since their discovery, have become the most widely used spice in the
world, and are eaten on a daily basis by at least one quarter of the world's adult population. America's
supply is grown in California, New Mexico, and Texas, with some imports from Mexico.
Storage & Selection
Chile peppers should have smooth, firm, glossy skin with no soft spots or shriveling. Store them
unwashed in paper towels in the refrigerator for up to three weeks. They can also be hung up to dry
and be used in their dried form.
Preparation
Chile peppers can be roasted like sweet peppers, although they are a bit more difficult to handle
because of their size. The stem and the seeds are usually removed when used in raw preparations. Since
much of the heat is contained in the seeds and membranes, you can adjust the level of heat in a dish by
removing all or part of them. You should wear gloves when you prepare hot peppers. Unless you are
scrupulous about cleaning your work surfaces and hands with warm soapy water the second you have
finished, peppers can cause painful burns or nasty irritations when hands and fingers that have come in
contact with them touch eyes and other sensitive parts of the body. Gloves that physicians use are more
practical than kitchen gloves, because they are thinner and adhere to your hands more tightly.
One of the most frequently suggested methods to roast peppers is to hold
them over gas flames until the pepper blisters and blackens all over.
This is tedious and time consuming, especially if you want to do several
peppers at one time. I suggest oven roasting, grilling, or broiling. Put
peppers on a sheet pan lined with foil, and roast in a hot (500°F) oven,
under the broiler, or on the grate of a barbecue grill. The more intense
the heat, the more often you need to turn the peppers. They should be
blackened and blistered rather evenly when done. This can take anywhere
from 15 to 30 minutes depending on which method you use.
Treat hot peppers like salt, because when too much is put in a dish, it's very hard to remove. You can
substitute one kind of chile for another, as long as you understand the heat differences.
Hot peppers can be frozen once they have been roasted, skinned, and seeded. They can also be frozen
without any preparation, except seeding and slicing, but the texture will be a bit wimpy.
Tony's Tip
How do you put out the fire in hot chiles? Water only spreads the fire because capsaicin isn't soluble
in water. The best remedy is to eat some starch such as bread, potatoes, and rice, or dairy products
such as yogurt, sour cream and milk.
Tony's Favorite Recipe
Hot and Sweet Pepper Sauce
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Varieties
The variety of chile peppers today is remarkable. They vary in size, color, and flavor, so another way
to categorize chiles is by their level of heat as measured in Scoville heat units; the higher the number
of Scoville heat units, the hotter the pepper. Here are the major varieties with the number of Scoville
heat units in parentheses where appropriate. Chiles may be called different names depending on the
grower, retailer, and where they are grown.
Anaheims (1,000 to 1,500) are long (6 to 8
inches), narrow, light to medium green peppers that turn a bright red when mature. It is also known as a
long green, long red, Texas, or New Mexico chile when fresh, and a California or New Mexico chile when
dried. It roasts wonderfully and is the kind most often found canned roasted and peeled on the
supermarket shelf. It can be stuffed and used where a mild chile flavor is called for.
Poblanos (2,500 to 3,000) are a dark green
chile with broad shoulders that taper to a point at the end. When dried, it is called a mulato. This is
the pepper of choice for stuffing as in chiles rellenos, or used for sauces.
Pasillas (3,000) are often confused with the
poblano, but the true pasilla is a long, dark green chile that tapers to a blunt end, and is mild to
medium hot, They are also called a chilaca chile, and when dried, a negro chile. They are used in
tamales and quesadillas, and can be interchanged with the poblano in many instances.
Jalapeños (3,500 to 4,500) are perhaps the
most widely used chile pepper. They're hot if you aren't used to eating chiles but medium hot if you
are. A dried and smoked jalapeño is called a chipotle. The color is a medium to deep green with a bullet
shape and meaty skin. Sometimes a jalapeño will have stripes called striations running lengthwise; these
are generally older varieties but the quality is not affected. You'll also occasionally see red
jalapeños, which, like red bell peppers, are merely mature versions of the pepper.
Serranos (7,000 to 25,000) are a small torpedo
shaped pepper similar in color to the jalapeño, but hotter and not as shiny, and is sometimes available
when red. They are usually used fresh in salsas.
Cayennes (35,000 to 40,000) are most commonly
dried, ground, and used as a spice, but this thin, tubular red pepper is occasionally available fresh.
Curved, slightly wrinkled, and up to 4 inches in length, the cayenne may go under several other names
such as Thai, Arbol, or Bird.
Thai/Bird peppers (15,000 to 30,000) are long,
thin, and usually green but may be available red when fully mature.
Arbols (15,000 to 30,000) are also known as a
type of cayenne and in some places, Thai or Bird chiles. They are hot, slender, tubular peppers, about 2
to 3 inches long, and bright green when immature, turning a bright red at maturity. They are most
commonly found dried.
Habanero. There are two types of this
supremely hot pepper. The most common is the yellow orange to bright orange Scotch Bonnet with a very
distinctive flavor if you use it judiciously and don't let the heat overpower you (200,000 to 300,000.)
The other type, the trademarked Red Savina Habanero is even hotter (300,000 to 400,000) and perhaps the
hottest pepper available commercially.
Yellow Chile or Yellow Wax peppers (heat
varies) are conical with a pale yellow color and a waxy look. They are sometimes called Yellow hot,
Caribe, or Caloro.
Fresnos (heat varies) are tapered like yellow chiles, and usually harvested when they are immature and a
pale green color. Sometimes they are a bright, red color if found when mature.
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