Episode 371. Growing chillies - a podcast by Richard

Join me in todays podcast where after receiving a lot of questions about chillies I thought i would go into these in a lot of detail. I also share the latest from the plots.



What varieties of chillies do I like to grow?There are hundreds and hundreds of different chilli varieties that are available on the market with many different heat and flavours but some of my favourite are



Sweet banana. A pretty mild varietyNumex twilight. Produce small but colourful chilliesApache. Can be sown nowMedusa Also can be sown nowBirds eye a small but very hot chilliJalapenos just because I love stuffing these with cheeseCaroline reaper a very hot chilliScotch bonnets a fairly hot but full of flavourChocolate habanero a Smokey flavour ripening to a chocolate brown colourGrowing chilli's transcript



Today I thought I will talk about growing chillies as I have been getting quiet a few questions that I thought it would be great to go over chillies today but firstly I want to apologise to you all.When this second lockdown started I said I was going to record 3 podcast a week. Unfortunately I have been so busy with work which has surprised me that I haven't been able to record these extra podcast’s. So I really want to apologise for that and rest assured if work wasn’t in the way I would be talking a lot more about grow your own.



Lets move on now growing chillies. If I am ever asked to pick one favourite vegetable to grow which is never an easy to question for me to answer but if I’m pushed I would have to say its chillies. Not only that chillies are probably one of the easiest to grow and don’t really suffer from any pests or diseases here in the UK.So where do we start with chillis if you are a first time grower I would wait till about March next year when garden centres will start selling plug plants these are basically baby plants. The reason I recommend this is that starting from seed is a whole skill set and for a new grower I believe its much better to start with a plug plant and spend that first year learning how to grow the plant.



If you are a bit more experienced or just want to grow from seed then this actually opens up the choice of what variety you can grow because there are hundreds of varieties out there which different heat levels and different flavours.This is probably a good point to mention a few of my favourite varieties. So yesterday I sowed a variety called Apache which along with another variety called Medusa can be sown now.



I love jalapinos so I always try to grow these mainly because I love to stuff these with Cheese in bake in the oven. Absolutely delicious.Another variety I am fond of is Numex twilight which I shared a photo on my instagram Yesterday of these plants we get plenty of small chillis of these I don’t find them particularly spicy.



If you don’t like heat then I recommend a variety called Sweet banana. These are very mild in fact I don’t find they have any heat at all. These are also great for pickling or stuffing.Then if you want really hot chillis something like the Caroline reaper or birds eye chilli are worth a try.



Rather then me listing all the other chillis I like I will add a list to the blog post for this episode over on thevegggrowerpodcast.co.ukSo you’ve got your seed when will we be sowing well as I mentioned earlier we can actually sow some now. I tried this for the first time last year and it worked rather surprisingly but the best varieties for these are Apache and Medusa. I would sow these in my heated propagator in order to provide some heat to start them off. If you don’t have heated propagator then start them off on a radiator. These seedlings would need potting up and growing on a well lit windowsill unless you have a heated greenhouse. Now the advantage with starting these now is that we can get an early crop.



But if your not wanting to start yet then we can wait till next year of course.

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