I grew Chile de Arbol in my garden last year and was not impressed. The fresh peppers were hot but had very little flavor and the yield wasn't all that good (yield might be better in the South.) I might as well just buy dried de arbols. Has anyone tried growing chile japones? Are they good, or a waste of time?
BTW, fresh Tabasco peppers are awesome.
-Bob
Nobody has ever successfully grown chilli.
I used to eat both dried Japanese chilis and arbol chilis a lot, and I never noticed much difference except the arbol chilis were longer. A Hispanic checker where I bought them insisted arbol chilis are hotter, but I never noticed that. It is true that the Japanese prefer mild chilis, and use them mostly for flavor.
I've heard that growing conditions strongly affect flavor, in particularly hotter conditions are alleged to result in hotter chilis, but I've never successfully grown chilis.
Somebody must be growing them. I just got back from the grocery sotre and there were some for sale.
Have you been successful with other chili peppers in your garden? Was this a normal growing season for you, or extra cool, extra rainy, etc.?
Not the growing season that just ended a few weeks ago, the year before that. The other chiles did OK -- and these did too but just weren't worth the trouble. There's not much meat on a de arbol pepper, and it didn't have much taste except hot, and the heat was not really extraordinary.
-Bob
If you like chilli that are hot, fleshy and flavoursome, try rocoto. Colloquially known as tree chilli, but quite different from de arbol. They are more cold tolerant than other chillis, so can be more successful in an indifferent growing season than other kinds. I've been very happy with mine, grown out of doors in southern England.
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