It doesn’t matter if you prefer the sweet crunch of a bell pepper or the fiery heat of a habanero; you’ll find growing your own peppers is easy and rewarding. Both sweet and hot peppers grow on plants that are productive, but also beautiful with glossy fruits in a variety of shapes, sizes and colors.
There are two main types of peppers: sweet and hot. Sweet peppers have little to no heat and a flavor that runs from mild to fruity. The immature fruits of most varieties of sweet peppers are green and ripen to rich hues of red, orange, yellow, purple, white and even chocolate brown. Large bell pepper plants produce 5 to 10 fruits each, while mini fruiting varieties typically yield several dozen peppers per plant.
Hot peppers, also called chilis, really kick it up a notch! They run from the mildly spicy poblano to the five-alarm fire of a ‘Carolina Reaper’, which has a Scoville Heat Unit of 2.2 million. Yikes! (Learn more about this spiciness rating system in “Scoville Scale” below.) My favorite hot peppers include jalapeño and cayenne varieties, which are so versatile in the kitchen. I like to dry most of my cayenne crop to grind for hot pepper flakes, while I find freezing excess jalapeños means plenty of peppers for winter chili and cornbread.
