aiptasia
Well-Known Member
Yep, I looked into that myself. Amazon has a few vendors selling whole dried pods (seeds and all) and ebay has a few people selling whole fresh peppers. There's even a guy selling young seedling plants on ebay for about $10 a pop. Apparently, they're a relatively undemanding pepper plant and grow quite well in the southern latitudes. The only recommended advice i've seen for their care is a slightly acidic soil with good drainage and the use of worm castings for fertilizer additions. Apparently, the worm castings really bring out the heat in the peppers (and other peppers) of this type.
For reference, the pepper I used weighed about eight grams. What's tricky about working with these peppers is that the scoville heat level can vary, even with peppers on the same plant. You might get one that hovers around 900,000 scoville units and one that eclipses 2,000,000 on the same plant.
I'm assuming what this is going to mean is, with every extract made, you'll have to gauge the heat level manually much in the same way that i'm doing now.
For reference, the pepper I used weighed about eight grams. What's tricky about working with these peppers is that the scoville heat level can vary, even with peppers on the same plant. You might get one that hovers around 900,000 scoville units and one that eclipses 2,000,000 on the same plant.
I'm assuming what this is going to mean is, with every extract made, you'll have to gauge the heat level manually much in the same way that i'm doing now.