My New Favorite Pepper in the Garden

We eat a lot of peppers at our house.  Now, I don't grow the super-hot varieties.  I don't like the peppers that make you sweat and your nose run.  Jalapenos are about the top of the Scoville Scale for my liking, and I do love jalapenos.  I don't do habaneros or definitely not ghost peppers or Carolina reapers.  Mainly the varieties we grow in abundance are: Anaheim, Jalapenos, Sweet Bell (several varieties), Banana and now, my new favorite: Shishitos!  Shishito peppers originate in East Asia and this year is the first year to add this variety to my pepper roster.

Shishitos grow quickly and produce abundantly.  I'm picking peppers about every three days or so.  Here is a little mess of shishito peppers that I picked.  You'll notice from the photo below that I like to leave the long stem on each pepper, if possible.  I'll show you our favorite way to cook them.

We get a cast iron skillet heating up on the stovetop with coconut oil in the bottom of the pan.  While that's getting hot, I drizzle olive oil on top of the shishito peppers and shake to make sure the oil has coated all the peppers.  By now there's smoke coming from the skillet and it's time to pour the peppers in.  You'll hear a lot of sizzling and some smoke will rise, so turn the vent hood on.  We usually put a cover on the skillet to keep the heat in and stop the oil from popping and making a huge mess in the kitchen.  We keep shaking the skillet to keep the peppers moving.  You'll notice than the peppers are starting to blister and char.  This is exactly what you want.  Now, pour the peppers into a serving bowl.

At this time salt the peppers real good and cut a lime in half, squeezing the juice onto the peppers.  We also like to add chunks of bleu cheese (the recipe calls for cotija cheese), and I'm sure grated parmesan would be good as well.

Put a cover on the serving dish and shake real good to distribute the salt, lime juice and cheese evenly.

And now it's time to devour them.  They are not spicy - the just have a nice taste and make a good side dish for most any meal.  They have become a family favorite and were a key part of our Independence Day BBQ.

From Peppers to Pesto

While half of the garden is finishing up in the summer heat, the other portion is still producing.  Peppers is one of those items.  We have several varieties going right now: Jalapenos.  These are probably my favorite, followed by Anaheims.  This year I planted a new variety (for us) called Shishito Peppers.  They are delicious, roasted and blistered.  I'll plant these from here on out.  We have a bunch of Banana Peppers that continue to produce.  We eat them raw.  We pickle a bunch of them, too.

There is a local meat market in our town called Cormier's Specialty Meats.  They sell boudin mixed with cream cheese for making poppers.  One afternoon last week I cut the banana peppers in half and seeded them.  Using a spoon, Tricia and I filled each pepper half with the boudin cream cheese and broiled in the oven.  Mighty good!

One of the other things we're making is pesto.  Plenty of pesto!  We have a lot of basil that popped up volunteer in the garden.  We've given away many seedlings and have a bunch more.  If you're in the area and would like some, get in touch and I'll pot one or two up for you.  We'll pick 8 cups of pesto leaves packed to make a big batch of pesto.  

We love to make pesto and freeze it in 16 ounce sour cream containers.  It makes the perfect lunch!  You simply start some pasta going on the stove, thaw out a container of pesto, drain your pasta and stir in the pesto and you have a delicious, easy meal.  The whole family loves it.  We even like to snack on it by spreading it on toast.  One word of warning:  Check your teeth before you go in public.  Pesto notoriously gets stuck between your teeth.  It's pretty embarrassing going out in town with big, green pieces of pesto in your teeth.  (That's experience speaking, right there!)

This week I planted a couple more rows of Purple Hull Peas and two rows of Black Turtle Beans.  Also, we got three varieties of pumpkins in the ground.  I got out my LSU Vegetable Planting Guide and looked at what I can begin planting in early August.  Time to get additional things in the ground!