Ode to a Pepper

The lemon pepper

In several of my recipes, I refer to a "lemon pepper." The version I have (I believe) is the Aji Amarillo or the Aji limon. There seems to be a fair amount of confusion concerning these peppers. There are different varieties of the hot lemon pepper. Here are the different varieties I have found: Aji Limon; hot lemon pepper (Capsicum annuum); hot lemon pepper; and lemon drop. I believe that the different varieties have different levels of heat because I as searched for information the level of heat reported ranged from medium heat to a heat just shy of a habanero.

Immature peppers

No matter which variety it is, it is my favorite of all of the hot peppers. It is spicy (one will work for a pot of gumbo) with a bit of a citrus taste. I grow mine each summer and always have a bumper crop of peppers (some nurseries carry the plants and you can find seeds and plants online).

The pepper plants

At the end of the summer, I freeze and dry peppers for the winter.  Also, I grind the dried peppers into powder and sometimes I just throw a whole dried pepper into a soup. I also keep some seeds for the next year. I am blogging this now so those of you who love hot peppers can order seeds or plants for next year. I am going to dig my plants up before the first frost and try keeping them alive this winter in the house.

So many peppers