We often  read the words “a pinch of chili pepper” among the ingredients of a recipe without any indication about the variety and quantity… As if it were a negligible surplus, only useful to spicy the recipe. Different varieties of chili peppers, however, not only will make your dish more or less spicy, but they will change its taste.

Without any doubt chili peppers has to be dosed properly; especially if we run into the Super-Hot varieties. The right variety can enhance and make a sauce, and and why not even a dessert, memorable. In overdose, however, it will hide any other flavor of the dish.

The cultivation at home of chili is not complex, it requires some attention during the germination of seeds. We’ll talk about this later on 😉 . For now we will briefly describe the varieties that we ourselves have grown this summer 🙂 .

Yellow Habanero Origin: America Taste: super hot. It has a very intense fruity flavor with slight hints of lemon. Recommended use: the intense flavor is perfect with sweet and sour dishes. We suggest you to try it in the traditional Moroccan tagine or in the Chinese noodles 😉 .

Habanero chocolate Origin: America Taste: intense, fruity and with light notes of cocoa. It remains a bit less spicy than the other qualities of habanero. Curiosity: Unfortunately, like other species of American origin, it terribly suffers low temperatures, therefore, you have to be very careful when you decide to put it outside in the garden. Recommended use: its intense fruity flavor, along with slight spiciness, allow you to use it in a large number of dishes. It is perfect for desserts, especially with chocolate.

Habanero white Origin: America Taste: disappointing. The fruits are slightly spicy, the taste does not have the complexity and richness of other species of habanero.

Bhut Jolokia Origin: India Taste: Very tasty and spicy, the taste is intense and it persists for several seconds in the mouth. Curiosity: it won the Guinness for its spiciness in 2006, but now it’s far from new records in recent years. The fruits grown this year were a bit disappointing, because the spiciness of fruits and flavor were strongly affected by the climate, much more than other varieties of chili peppers. Recommended use: in sauces made with  tomatoes because the flavor and spiciness are enhanced by the acidity of tomatoes.

Jade Origin: Unknown Taste: its spiciness varies greatly depending on the individual fruit. It has a more traditional taste, less fruity that other quality cultivated.

Naga Morich Origin: India Taste: very spicy, with bitter notes of lemon zest. Curiosity: we found out that this plant  is more resistant to cold, it has suffered less than others this summer.

Black namaqualand Origin: South Africa Taste: certainly very spicy, but less than other varieties we tasted. The flavor is reminiscent in part of the habanero, but with less pronounced fruity notes. Curiosity: this plant is very beautiful, the leaves tends to purple color at the top, while the bottom part is green and slightly hairy. The flowers have a beautiful purple color. The fruits are very dark purple, almost black, and turn red in late maturation. The dark color of leaves and fruits allows the plant to absorb the maximum possible energy from sunlight 🙂 .

Seven pod Origin: America Taste: wefound the Seven Pod a bit disappointing; it is extremely spicy, but has very little aroma. Curiosity: in the Caribbean regions where this comes from it is called Seven Pot, since only one of these peppers is enough to make seven spicy stew pots, so be careful 😉 .

Morouga Scorpion Origin: America Taste: the aroma of Morouga is extremely intense, you can feel it as soon as you scratch the peel of the fruit. It tastes great, one of the best we tasted. Curiosity: Currently it holds the record as the hottest chili in the world. Recommended use: sauces made with tomatoes. Ketchup with a bit of Morouga is really great, especially because the mild sweetness of ketchup attenuates the hot sauce, allowing you to use a little bit of chilli and get a much more intense aroma.