I was shopping this evening at WAL-MART food section and partly because we have a healthy continent of Hispanics in the area they have decent selection of various peppers. I wanted a few habaneros to play with, but I was informed they were out. Looking over I saw some green jalapenos and since they were inexpensive I collected about 8 and bagged them up.
Now I don’t know why I have never tried a fresh green jalapeno pepper before. I have no excuses. I suppose I thought it was just another Mexican mystery pepper and would probably light my mouth on fire like the habaneros do.
So anyway I get home and want to liven up a couscous and tomatoes dish I am re-heating and so I take a very thin slice of the pepper and cautiously try it. Hmm… big pepper fruitiness kind of like a fresh green pepper, but better and more flavorful somehow …and almost no heat. Oh well I figure it’s a little green pepper and slice and dice it into the tomatoes. I begin eating it and …Oh my! … THERE’S the heat and what heat! Perfect! Not abusive, bullying and chest pounding like a habanero, but a marvelous, confident perfect heat that makes your taste buds glow with happiness.
Jalapenos are still pretty spicy for a guero like me’s delicate sensibilities, but taken in moderation they are quite a nice addition to a dish. I often put 'em on sandwiches too.
Be careful chopping up fresh hot peppers! Use gloves or chuck them in a food processor. In a pinch I wrap plastic bags around my hands.
If the oil gets on your hands too much it can react badly and BURN LIKE EVERLOVING HELL. When it happened to me (I think it’s a critical mass thing, never was a problem and then BOOM) it felt so bad that if I closed my eyes I imagined fire was burning off my flesh.
I usually have no problems cutting jalapeno peppers without wearing gloves. However while cutting them I went to use the bathroom and didn’t think to wash my hands before handling the equipment. You’ll be happy to know I did wash my hands before returning to my chopping duties. After a few minutes there was a definite and unpleasant burning sensation in my nether regions that required me to abandon my task and jump in the shower to dust off my equipment.
Wash your hands before handling other parts of your body.
But seriously, be careful with the japs. They vary wildly in heat. I’ve had some that barely registered, many that are what you would describe simply as “hot” (slightly hotter than Tobasco), and some that really lit my ass up. I had a fresh roasted one at an authentic Mexican restuarant a couple months ago that was every bit the angry devil a habanero is.
I agree about their heat. It really annoys me to have one with no heat: I’m not a fan of the bell pepper, but sometimes that’s what they taste like (Arby’s jalapeno poppers were a real disappointment in this regard–and my expectations were pretty low to begin with).
On the other extreme, I had a fancy version of a jalapeno popper at a fancy Caribbean/Mexican restaurant run by an insane genius here in town, and that thing was damn near inedible. Incredibly delicious, but it was so incredibly hot.
I’m sure I’m leaving stuff out as it just seems like something I throw together, but my pork green chili goes thusly:
four Jalapeños
one Serrano
(roast on open flame, I use the ‘bean burner’ on the BBQ, split and remove the seeds and ribs of the Japs*)
about 1 lb. Pork roast (or loin, or whatever’s cheap)
8-12 tomatillos
one can stewed tomatoes
1 onion chopped
garlic
1 box chicken stock
bay leaf
Salt n Pepper to taste
Cook a couple hours, it’s better the second day.
(*Yes, I’m calling them Japs. We Called 'em Japs at Pizza Hut 25 years ago and I’ll continue to call them that. It’s not racist, it word-overloading.)
Oh give me the biggest fucking break on the planet. You really think I’m using a way to insult Japanese people from my grandparents’ era to describe a pepper from Mexico? When you’re done patrolling for racism under rocks, behind sofas, and in your neighbors’ attics, I’d like an explanation for how you could’ve even possibly thought I meant something worthy of a :dubious:. I’ll be waiting.
I love me some jalapeños. Sliced, uncooked ones are essential for salt-and-pepper shrimp, phở, fried whole fish, and other Asian foods. When I make pico de gallo I don’t bother roasting them. I like the fresh ‘green’ flavour they have when they’re simply chopped up.
Thirded. I grow habaneros (which are at the top end of the heat spectrum, only eclipsed by the bhut jolokia pepper) and eat them fairly regularly (just cut in slices, raw, on a sandwich), but those jalapenos are all over the place in heat, and I’ve had some that reached the heat of some milder, but still scorching, habaneros. Same with serranos. Even poblanos, which are generally in the very little heat zone, can sometimes pack a tiny punch (not anywhere near the same category of the other peppers mentioned, but enough to spoil dinner for someone who doesn’t like spicy food.)
So, beware, as these peppers can be a bit unpredictable and heat varies wildly. If you want a little heat and a good amount of flavor, I would suggest you try some poblanos next time for comparison.
Breathe deep, dude. I was joking–I’d just never seen that slang for jalapenos before. (I’ve never seen a smiley decrease the communication of humor in the written word before–my fault!)
Congratulations on discovering the joys of jalapenos. We get them year round in the grocery. During the summer, I get them from farmers’ markets - where they are so cheap I’m embarrassed to buy them by themselves, since I don’t buy pounds of them. I’ve grown them, but my soil is wrong, and they never get decently spicy.
I mostly use them for nachos. And I’ve never had a problem with my hands - but I do wash after cutting.
I think I had bottled ones in college once, but fresh is so much better.
Jalapenos appear to be the cheapest fresh vegetable in the supermarket. They are often under a dollar a pound (usually less, I’ve seen them as low as 30 cents). I buy three or four, and often the scale cannot detect them and the cashier shrugs and drops 'em in my bag free.
My girlfriend and I joke that if we become poor and destitute we will survive on a jalapeno only diet.
There’s a picture about halfway down the page, on the right, that shows each of the peppers discussed in the quote.
Also, when you eat a whole roasted one, it will have all its seeds and veins, which tends to make them hotter. De-seeding the pepper before chopping and adding to a dish should reduce its heat level.
Interesting–I wonder why? Given that capsaicin is “designed” (I know, I know) to prevent mammals from eating the pepper, I wonder whether damage to the skin promotes production of capsaicin. Or is it that scarred ones are older?
Close–but the vast majority of the heat is in the pith, not in the seeds. Usually when you deseed a pepper, you get rid of the pith also, which is why folks think it’s the seeds holding the heat. If you want to moderate your dish, you can put in part of the pith.
When I make pico de gallo I usually just use Serranos. Fresh Serranos are plentiful, cheap, and delicious.
Boil some tomatoes and Serrano peppers for a while, blend them together with some salt, and there you go, a nice authentic Mexican table salsa. Perfect for putting in tacos, eggs (I can’t eat plain eggs without salsa), or pretty much anything savory.
One of the nice things about increasing Latinization of parts of the US is expanded and higher quality produce sections. I’m glad you like the Jalapenos.
There’s a Chinese restaurant on the east side of town that uses fresh sliced jalapenos to make any dish “hot’n’spicy” upon request. It’s amazing.
Lhod: sorry for misinterpreting your post. That face is called dubious, so I read to say “‘japs?’ I am suspicious of your motives in the use of this term.” You see now how it looks like that’s what you were saying, right?
Yeah, I see that. Saw it at the time, but didn’t think it through carefully; I was just trying to make a throwaway joke.
re: Serranos: they’re one of the peppers we’ve grown in our garden. Weirdly, hot peppers do really well in our part of Appalachia, and every year we get far more than we can consume. One year my wife took our serrano crop and made an incredible hot pepper jelly that we gave out at Christmas; I took the rest of the crop and fermented them with garlic and salt to make a killer pseudoSriracha sauce.
