Store jalapeno heat levels are wildly variable. If I grew my own same plant peppers consistent?

Supermarket jalapenos go from mild to fairly substantial levels of heat. While this might not matter for some dishes if I am eating individual raw sliced pepper strips with hummus some are OK and some are too hot to enjoy. Assumedly this randomness is due to the fact the peppers come off different plants and have different ages at picking.

If you grow your own peppers are peppers picked at the same time off the same plant consistent in heat levels or do individual plants produce peppers with random heat levels?

One anecdotal data point is my brother-in-law. He grew peppers in his garden and he found they were much more variable in heat than store bought ones. Pretty much every pepper was a surprise.

My buddy Eric at work grows peppers too, and I remember one batch that came out absurdly hot (and I love hot food) - he’s mentioned to me in passing that they tend to be pretty random.

Just to clarify, even when off the same pepper plant?

I’ve found that peppers that get lots of sun, all day long, will all end up very hot. With less sun it varies a lot.

For me, good fertilization seems to be the key, but heat is all over the map.

We get varieties from grandpa in New Mexico. Every crop is different - like bland to painful (actually inducing instant hiccups which makes getting the beer/ice water/iced tea down really hard.

I’ve heard it claimed that over-watering the plant results in less heat. Anyone know if this is true?

Yes - although it’s usually described in the converse - that is - stressing the plants by underwatering produces hotter peppers. I guess that really means over-watering causes them to produce their nominal level of capsaicins, not specifically a lower level.

I’ve managed to have variable heat levels from jalapenos from the same plant. One in particular gave me both firecrackers and total duds.

All of the peppers in my garden are incredibly hot. I mean they’re hot for their variety. I don’t do anything weird, but I’m sure they get dry a few times in the Georgia heat.

A couple decades back the esteemed scientists at Texas A&M University created the TAM jalapeno, a mild Jalapeno. One of the stupidest ideas ever. I mean, stupid. How stupid can you be? The Aggies are famed for their stupidity in Texas, and for their big fat butts. That TAM pollen has gone everywhere, and it’s harder and harder to find a truly hot Jalapeno. The only stupider thing the Aggies ever did was bulldoze T.V. Munson’s original collection of grapevines he created after saving the world viniculture industry with rootstock from native Texas vines. God, I’m mad, if only my peppers are hot this year!

Sublimely tautological.

Fire hot.

I have found that the earlier peppers on a plant are milder than the later ones. This would go along with the hotter weather = hotter peppers hypothesis. 'Round here, a plant can bear from now until November if you start the plants indoors in February.

I grew a jalapeno plant this year, I must have got some of those TAM ones. Mild as. Not one with any kick whatsoever. tasty chopped in an omelette with tomato and cheese but no bite.

On the other hand, the habanero plant fruit has some decent kick. Eating one of those brings tears to the eyes.

I bought some seeds for the Trinidad Scorpion Chilli so now I’m waiting for spring to plant them out.

Heh. It works whichever way you interpret it.

I assume the peppers receiving lots of sun throughout the growing season are producing more capsaicin as a defense mechanism, and as others are indicating that could be tempered with more watering.

It’s my understanding that the heat level is partly genetic and partly due to conditions.
So, get one plant and propagate cuttings, so you have a population of identical plants.
Do this indoors so you can control light, temps, pests, etc.

Hydroponics is easier and cheaper than it seems.
A setup to grow peppers, cilantro, other herbs would be quite affordable.
It’s all designed to grow cannabis, but it’ll grow peppers too.

Pepper plant pretty.

But peppers are indiscriminate whores, taking pollen from any random bee who’s visited any ol’ vaguely related plant. They cross-pollinate and hybridize really easily, and there are a slew of genes that control the heat level, so lots of room for variation. Every fertilized ovum (flower) on a plant could have a different pepper daddy and different genes.

You can use a Q-Tip and brush it gently across each flower when the pollen is thick, and it may self-pollinate, though. Not all pepper plants are good at self-pollination, but for the ones that do it, it helps to keep the line purer, and then your peppers will be a little more consistent.

Pepper may get spicier when stressed to prevent mammals from eating them. They “want” to be eaten by birds, who don’t taste capsaicin. Mammal digestion breaks down seeds; bird digestion leaves them intact and drops the seeds in a new spot inside bird poop, furthering the genetic line.

Yeah, this seems to be the big determinant. The jalapenos I grew in a hot Dallas summer with plenty of light, water and fertilizer were consistently almost too hot to eat- way more than store bought ones. Spring and fall ones weren’t so hot, and were more variable