Gardening Intervention

[hosspak]

What does everyone do with their pepperchinis and those others of the same size? I'm thinking of pickling them but I want a different flavor then my B&B brine... I don't really like the brine that you get at mexican food places they pickle their carrot slices in. Any ideas? 100 for the best recipe...

 

[journey11]

If I can ever find that perfect pickled pepper recipe, I want to grow pepperoncinis. So far I've not been happy with any of the hot banana pepper recipes I've tried. Some deeper flavor is missing...too vinegary and hot and little else. There must be some spice it needs...

I use all of my hot peppers either fresh, dried and ground or canned up in hot pepper butter (which is pretty darn good anyway), but any I've tried to can as pickled rings to toss on sandwiches or pizza haven't tasted quite right and end up getting tossed out. I don't know if maybe they need fermented or something.

 

[hosspak]

Ok, hot pepper butter got my attention... Do you have a recipe? I have put many of my harvested pepperchini's in my leftover B&B pickle brine, those are very tasty. I have many fish peppers of the same size that I want to pickle, these are very spicey so they would be sweet and hot. Banana peppers seem to get too soft and mushy, even when freezing. Still searching for something....different/better???

 

[baymule]

I am supposing you are talking about hot peppers? I made sweet pickled hot peppers last year with some cayenne peppers, it was awesome. Basically I cut the peppers into rings, put garlic cloves and onion wedges in the jar and poured hot syrup over them and sealed. Then did the water bath. I eat them with a spoon! They made fantastic nachos too!

 

[hosspak]

I am supposing you are talking about hot peppers? I made sweet pickled hot peppers last year with some cayenne peppers, it was awesome. Basically I cut the peppers into rings, put garlic cloves and onion wedges in the jar and poured hot syrup over them and sealed. Then did the water bath. I eat them with a spoon! They made fantastic nachos too!

What was your brine recipe?

 

[baymule]

1 cup apple cider vinegar to 2-3 cups of sugar. Plus stuffing onion sections and garlic cloves in the jar. I cooked the peppers, but not the onion or garlic. I found a good pictorial on Cowboy Candy which is jalapenos and it is yummy too. I used the cayenne pepper because it was what I had.

http://tastykitchen.com/blog/2011/09/candied-jalapenos-cowboy-candy/

 

[journey11]

Here's the hot pepper butter recipe...

Hot Pepper Mustard (Butter)

(yields about 7 pints)

· 4 quarts chopped hot and/or sweet banana peppers (3.3 lbs or about 36 large peppers)
· 1 qt. vinegar
· 1 qt. prepared yellow mustard (don't go cheap, get a good quality mustard)
· 4 c. sugar
· 1 1/4 c. flour
· 2 tbsp. salt (optional; I use 1 tbsp.)

1. Wearing vinyl gloves, cut up and deseed/devein the peppers. Remove stem and blossom ends and cut into large chunks. You can toss in some of the seeds if you want it really hot. I go about 50/50 on the ratio of hot and sweet banana peppers. This gives it a kick without burning your tongue off!

I also like to take a few dark red peppers aside and chop them by hand before adding to the pot. They look really nice suspended in the golden yellow of the mixture.

2. Puree the peppers in a blender using some of the vinegar.

3. In a large pot, combine all ingredients except the flour.

4. In a small bowl, add enough water to the flour to make a smooth paste. Be sure to work all the lumps out.

5. Add flour paste to the mixture.

6. Simmer over medium heat until thickened, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking.

IMPORTANT -- Try not to let the mustard boil as this will incorporate air bubbles into the mixture. Air bubbles are the number one cause of the mustard boiling out of the jars while in the water bath. If you think it looks bubbly, let it sit awhile on the lowest heat setting until they are gone. Stir gently.

7. Pour into hot jars leaving 1/2" headspace. Wipe rims and place lids. Hot water bath 15 minutes for pints and half-pints.

It's really good on sandwiches of course and for a dipping mustard with summer sausage or whatever. I like to baste a ham with it before baking too. I got this recipe from an older lady my dad goes to church with, but really it isn't approved anymore to thicken canned goods with flour, so if you want to be on the safe side use Clear-Jel (modified cornstarch that doesn't thicken until it cools) instead. I've been making it for years before I heard about that though and still continue to live on the edge with this one recipe. This is a good recipe to use up a bunch of hot peppers if you have 'em coming out of your ears.

 

[hosspak]

Here's the hot pepper butter recipe...

Hot Pepper Mustard (Butter)

(yields about 7 pints)

· 4 quarts chopped hot and/or sweet banana peppers (3.3 lbs or about 36 large peppers)
· 1 qt. vinegar
· 1 qt. prepared yellow mustard (don't go cheap, get a good quality mustard)
· 4 c. sugar
· 1 1/4 c. flour
· 2 tbsp. salt (optional; I use 1 tbsp.)
A quart of mustard???? What supposedly happens when using flour? This sounds like a really good recipe!
Thanks.

 

[journey11]

Oh, I guess there is a little worry that it might not heat evenly throughout. It's a pretty small amount of flour compared to all the other ingredients. The Clear-Jel would work well too. I've never had a jar go bad. I wouldn't get too ambitious and try to put it in a quart jar though.

I've found yellow mustard in quart containers on the very bottom shelf at the grocery store. It makes a lot of pepper butter.

 

[JimWWhite]

I need a gardening intervention too. The next time I plant 20 tomato plants I want a bunch of people who really care for me to stop me beforehand. I've got so many tomatoes I'm taking them into work. Some people took them at first but then they just sat there in the break room. Then I started taking them around in Wal-Mart plastic bags and leaving them in people's seats when they were away from their desks. That worked for a while but then they just started dumping them on my desk. Now if I walk outside when I go leave work to go home they've 'egged' my car with tomatoes...