These pickled chillies are wonderful, made from sweet cayenne chillies, all of the flavour, none of the heat.
I grew one plant of sweet cayenne pepper, as an experiment, and it was completely wonderful. They are amazingly productive, and the fruits can be taken at any time, green or red. I chose to pick them green for a number of reasons.
I like green.
It’s been so cold I worried about waiting for them to redden.
I couldn’t wait any longer – impatient!
When the chillies ripen to red they are at their strongest, but with a scoville scale of zero, they are never, ever hot. So you get all the flavour of the chillies but none of the heat.
I don't mind the heat so much but I don't like my food to hurt, and I do like to taste the flavour of the pepper rather than just have it blowing my head off.
I have found that growing chillies in the greenhouse to be more rewarding than tomatoes. First of all chillies are much more forgiving than tomatoes. You can easily recover situations that would otherwise destroy your tomato crop. Miss a day watering and you can be fine - with tomatoes it could be the end of the world!
Also there are not so many side shoot and associated humidity issues, and chillies, so far as I know, do not suffer from blight.
The range of chillies is quite remarkable, and you can choose ones that fit your heat tolerance - they're not all explosive!
Enjoy – they are gorgeous!
Make a brine of:
2.5 cups of white vinegar
Half a cup of water
A few black pepper corns
1 oz (25 g) non iodized salt)
1 oz (25 g) sugar
Bring the brine to the boil.
Pack your jar with chillies and pour the hot brine over them.
If eating within a month, let them cool and put them in the fridge. For longer keeping, put into a pan of boiling water and boil for 15 mins.
Then cool and refrigerate.
Instructions
Pickled chillies