Home grown salad in the middle of the winter :-)

Today we picked our home grown salad that we started before going to India. December 14th. So it's now more or less than six weeks since we put the seeds in the "containers" in the Zengrow.

It worked really well! OK, it took a while before the salad was ready. And no large scale growing. But the taste was excellent! And as an experiment it was really fun!

We have already started new salad seeds in the available "slots" in the Zengrow. New exciting varieties :-)

Regards,
  Mats

Repotting baccatum

My aji limon and orange baccatum are ahead of the other chiles in the mini greenhouse. Today it was time to repot them. And to take some seedlings away, so the other remaining ones get more space.

Here they are. The leading duo!

I don't know why they develop roots in the air.

Look at this long root! It's sure time for repotting :-)

I saved four plants of one variety, and three of the other.
I planted them deep in the new pots, so only an inch of the plant is above the soil.

I can see from last years notes, that I repotted the first ones in 2010 on February 1st. Keeping my fingers crossed that 2011 will be a great chile year!

Have a great weekend!
   Mats

Chile news ... Roasting chiles.

Well my friends. I hope that it wasn't one of you.

http://www.dn.se/nyheter/varlden/chiliangor-ledde-till-sjukhusbesok

It must have been really hot chiles. Four people two hospital with breathing difficulties after roasting them in an oven.

Three more today!

• PI 596058 - Chuquisac (Capsicum baccatum)
• Chiltepin Mexico (Capsicum annuum)
• Black Cayman (Capsicum chinense)

I was surprised to see my chiltepin germinate so fast. My experience is that they take longer time. So this is either A) promising, or B) bad sign that the seeds are not pure, and therefore not really from chiltepin.

My vote and hope is option A! Promising!

The ones that I still wait for are some old chinense seeds. Maraba, cheiro de para and caronog. But also a Florida bird pepper (undomesticated annuum), a pubescens, pimenta da Neyde and goat pepper.

Well, two weeks is not that much for chile seeds to germinate. So I will stay cool!

A question to you geeks out there.
Do you keep track of when your varieties germinate, and so on? And in that case, how do you do it? I created a database some years ago, in which I log some "events", and export spreadsheets from it. If anyone is interested in the technical details, please let me know, and I can write about it and share it with you. It's based on OpenOffice / LibreOffice, so it's a cross platform solution.

Hot regards,
   Mats

Action in the mini green house

Two old favorites, and one new variety for this year showed up this morning!

The good old ones
Malagueta large Salvador 2001
Malagueta mediumSalvador 2001

And the new one
Black Cayman

Eight varieties have germinated since January the 3rd. Hopefully some more will show up!

Have a great weekend!
   Mats

A Brazilian trio

Yesterday and today, three more varieties showed up.

It was the Girino (that I grew a couple of years ago). I think it's a C. chinense. It's a very nice one.

And my old favorite malagueta. The small variety that I bought 2001 on the market in Salvador, Brazil. I think that it's amazing to see that 10 year old seeds still are ok. I really hope that it will survive, but so far it looks good! This picture is some years old.

And the third variety is one that I got from a friend in Brazil. He calls it "black pepper". It will be exciting to see what it turns out to be :-)

Wishing you all a nice end of the working week.

Regards from a "lightless" and ice-slippery Stockholm.
   Mats

Second place

It's amazing to watch the tiny seedlings. It's six days since we put the seeds in soil, and today the second variety showed up.

And that was the orange baccatum from my friend Jan. Thanks Jan!

2 of 18 are up. Still a long way to go :-)

Have a great Sunday!

Salad

It's been a couple of weeks since I put the salad seeds in my Zengrow. Now the salad is growing, and they leaves are around 10 cm.  Soon we will have fresh salad to eat :-)

... Mats

We have a new favorite sauce / paste

I stumbled over this one, and being a rocoto fan, I couldn't resist to buy it.

It's a really good one. Quite hot, with that special taste of rocotos. Our current favorite in the fridge :-)

 

Regards,

  Mats

And the fastest one this year is ...

... Aji Limon (Capsicum baccatum). Thank you Allen :-)

It's always exciting to follow the development of the seedlings in the mini greenhouse. This year I am trying to germinate some really old seeds that are 8-10 years old. So I wonder if they will germinate at all. What doesn't one do to increase the excitement :-)

Looking at the seedlings is a good therapy these "lightless" days in January. When we went out this morning, we saw this bike. I wonder when the owner plans to go on a ride with it. My guess is - not in the nearest future....

Have a hot weekend!
   Mats

We have started!

Today is the day! The beginning of the chile year 2011 :-)

I have cut down a lot on the number of seeds that I keep at home, but it is still very very hard to choose what to grow!

The themes for this year is a mix of "greatest hits", chinense and some (for me) new exciting varieties. The first six are old Brazilian favorites. Followed by some new varieties.

1. Maraba (Capsicum chinense)
2. Malagueta large Salvador 2001 (Capsicum frutescens)
3. Malagueta liten Salvador 2001 (Capsicum frutescens)
4. Malagueta medium Salvador 2001 (Capsicum frutescens)
   
5. Cheiro de Para Recife 2001 (Capsicum chinense)
6. Caronog '01 (Capsicum chinense)
7. PI 596058 - Chuquisac (Capsicum baccatum)
8. Florida bird pepper (Capsicum annuum)
9. PI 585259 (Capsicum pubescens)
10. Girino GRM
11. Black pepper
12. Chiltepin Mexico (Capsicum annuum)
13. Pimenta da Neyde (Capsicum annuum)
14. Goat pepper
15. Orange baccatum (Capsicum baccatum)
16. Black Cayman (Capsicum chinense)
17. St. Kitt's Red (Capsicum chinense)
18. Aji Limon (Capsicum baccatum)
19. "Curly Looks" - a cactus! (Epiphyllum guatemalense)

I'm hoping for a hot summer, so the chinense will enjoy it!

Here we have my helper, planting seeds!

And here I am with a seed envelope...

The team ...

... in action.

Seeds.

More seeds...

And more....

Finished!

Anyone else who has started? Do you have any "themes" or favorites for this year?

Regards,
  Mats

The chile year 2011

A short update :-)

I have had a tradition to start my first seeds on January 1st. But this year will be different. We have been away in India for a couple of weeks, and have just arrived home.

So, I will decide on this year's theme, and let you know as soon as the new seeds are in soil!

Click on the picture if you are interested in seeing more pictures.

 

Happy New Year!

    Mats