how to dry HOT PEPPERS ?

I am starting to harvest my hot peppers: CHILE NUMEX JOE PARKER (6" long).
I'd like to dry them and hang them in the kitchen, like they do in Italy with strings ...
Does anybody know how to do it?

Hi drthor,

I do not use strings to dry my hot peppers. I have several wicker baskets that I use instead. I pick them intermittently when the quantities will be large enough to put about an inch worth of peppers in the basket. Then I just give them a gentle shake when I walk past and eventually they dry nicely. I think this year I may try a bit of oven drying as wel just for kicks!

Jeff

let me understand:
You lay the peppers inside the basket
and you let them dry
outside or inside?

Thanks for your help

drthor, when I grew cayenne peppers long ago, I sewed them together with a needle and strong thread just like making one of those popcorn/cranberry garlands for the Christmas tree. I put the needle through the green stem end and afterwards let them hang somewhere to dry. If your peppers are big or heavy, try some fishing line.

That is correct. I dry them inside. Much to my wife's chagrin, during the summer I have two or three baskets of peppers in varying stages of drying on the credenza in the dining room.

Jeff

thanks y'all I will try and let you know

Another great way to do it is using dental floss. Strong stuff!!! just use a needle and thread it with dental floss. Tie a small stick, popsicle stick or something on the end before you thread on your first pepper and let them hang down like they do in France. The stick will keep them from breaking through your first pepper. Not across like a clothes line but 10-15 hanging straight down.

I think these methods are very location dependent. I've never been able to dry a pepper without it molding here. Even if the exterior looks okay the interior cavity is almost always moldy thus rendering the pepper unusable. I have to use oven drying methods. Instructions are available on line.

It has been so hot here in Dallas lately.
I was thinking to lay the peppers to dry on a screen in the sun.
Will it work? if I keep shaking them?

As long as the humidity is low that's perfect. You could place reflective material, like tin foil around them to speed things up. Those folding windshield thingies work well, the ones that reflect.

Yes, we're hot enough to dry them with temps in the 90's and then some come pepper harvest time but with 60%-80% humidity we're not dry enough to keep them from molding.

Last week Phoenix had 3% humidity, yesterday it bounded up to 7%. :-| Not sure about Dallas.

Amazing that anything grows!

What's amazing is the water bill - ugh! Although my beds are heavily mulched with wood chips, it still takes a lot of water to grow all these tomatoes that I love.

Oh, I can't imagine. Our garden is spring fed. We've got a forty gallon cistern and the spring puts out about three gallons a minute. If we are droughty we have to be careful to break down the watering by section or we'll run the cistern dry and burn up the pump. What with a quarter acre in veggies that's not hard to do. Okay, now I've gone off topic. So what is the average humidity in Dallas, Drthor? I think Dallas is humid.

right now 39%

Has anyone tried a dehydrator? I have a small one I used to make jerky with and have wondered about drying herbs etc with it. Any advise.
Helen

Helenchild, yes, I have used a dehydrator and it works well. The only thing is if you are drying hot peppers there will be fumes. The first time I tried it I started the dehydrator in the kitchen and went to another part of the house. When I went back into the kitchen I could hardly breathe, the fumes were so bad. I moved everything to the garage and finished them out there. The garage smelled for a while, but it was still better than having them in the house. I was drying datil, fatali and some other really hot peppers. Don't be afraid to try it, just put the equipment in a well ventilated area. Good luck.

p1mkw, I like the idea of using the garage. Good thinking!

Thanks p1mkw.

>> I think these methods are very location dependent. I've never been able to dry a pepper without it molding here. Even if the exterior looks okay the interior cavity is almost always moldy thus rendering the pepper unusable. I have to use oven drying methods. Instructions are available on line.

I have barely tested this in coastle PNW, but agree. I bought some habaneros from a fruit stand and tried to dry them inside, next to a sunny window. No noticable drying, and then they rotted.

I bought a second-hand food dehydrator for $15-20, but the temp is not really controlled, and I don't know what temp would reduce the seed's viability.

I suppose it doesn't matter; I should halve them first and pull out the seeds anyway, for drying in a rainy climate ... I assume.

Corey

I've never seen them halved and it isn't the sun that will dry them; it's low humidity. Our crops are too large to use a dehydrator. I have a convection oven that does the job beautifully. Check out online low temp oven methods.

I placed a bunch outside today on a screen frame with another screen frame over. 110°, humidity 8%. I halved them thinking they would dry better. Did not remove pulp or seeds.

Also made up a batch of chicken marinade: Stuff habanero's in glass jar, fill with tequila, let sit 2 months. Strain and use the liquid as marinade for chicken. Add spices and some honey, to the remaining pulp and use as a basting sauce. We'll see!

We make jerk sauce from habaneros and Scotch bonnets though the chicken marinade sounds delicious. Hmm, am I willing to spare the tequila? lol

Laurel, I used small jars. :-) There's only two of us and I figure any leftover marinade would have to be tossed.

I used to buy small hot chili peppers and shred them coarsely into a bottle of inexpensive vodka, then store it in the freezer. Pertsovka! (sp?)

Eventually I tweaked the recipie by adding just a little sweet cinnamon liquor. That way, the pink flavor warned unsuspecting people what was coming.

But I've lost my capacity to deal with hot spice: I think i stripped my stomach lining over the years with Szechuan & Pertsovka.

My part of the PNW isn't AS humid as one might think from all the rain; I don't know why not. But "dry" does not describe us.

it sounds as if I should remove any seeds I wnat to save FIRST, and then dry the rest in an oven or dehydrator.

Corey

When viewing my habanero plant, it seemed I had SO MANY peppers...........some were side lined to the tequila marinade jar, here's what's left - not so many really. They should finish drying today, with a projected 108° and the same 8% humidity. But - there's a few more still on the plant trying to ripen.

My redneck solar dehydrator!

Cool!

Lining the wheelbarrow with aluminum foil would cook 'em as you dry 'em!

Here in the PNW, we'd have to drill a hole in the wheelbarrow to let the rain out.

Corey

Here is how I am drying my pepper ... and I think it is working !

Humidity in your area drthor, is chancy, then storing them to maintain dryness and color, huge odds there.I miss the strings of cayenne peppers, garlic cloves, hang drying, but lose too many to mold, too easily. That dark color streaking the pepper is not too good a sign, hope you oven/dehydrator dried some too.

oh oh

Peppers love heat/humidity to grow, you should still be making new ones, but have a Plan B, they can't handle humidity at all after ripening

My greenhouse is dual purpose, up to the summer it's great for getting an early start on growing but in the summer it's far to hot to grow anything in, so we dry tomatoes, peppers, courgettes, and make yogurt! Do you have a cold frame or greenhouse?

I don't have a greenhouse in Dallas. Too cold in the winter and way too hot in the summer.
Hola'

I'm glad to hear that you don't have a greenhouse! Do you know how more it would set me back if I had to buy or build a greenhouse? I could barely afford the 40 lbs. of bat guano.

My laundry room is my green-house. I cannot immagine how much in A/C I will need to spend to keep up a green house here in DFW!