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Habaneros - What to do with this years crop?


FoodMan

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  • 5 months later...

I have a bounty of habanero peppers. I made a sauce out of them, frozen some but they are still comming. I can't throw them away, too wasteful. Besides, despite thier insane heat, they have great flavor, real fruity.

Has anyone tried stuffing them.

Any other uses? HELP!!

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Ah, it's been way too long since I did a butt. - Susan Fahning aka "snowangel"

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One summers evening drunk to hell, I sat there nearly lifeless…Warren

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You can dry them and/or pickle them. You can make a few types of salsa with them and can a couple of batches of it. That should take care of your crop. The dried ones can be used for salsa picante, by themselves, or along with some dried chiles that have a little less heat. Rick Bayless has a good recipe for salsa picante in his "Authentic Mexican."

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We dried a copious harvest in the smoker a year or two back. Those are real pick-me-ups for all sorts of things. They seem to keep for ever, and the fruitwood smoke goes well with the Habanero peachyness.

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sure you can stuff them. you need to make sure you get as much of the pith out as possible, since that is where the heat is (for some reason people still think it is in the seeds, but it isnt). i stuff thim with a little cheese, brush them with olive oil and stick them on the grill and they are amaazinnnng. i suppose you can also fry them, or bread them and fry them, but i have a grill going at least twice a week and rarely a fryer so i can recommend them as a pre-steak appetiser.

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I usually use a cream cheese mixed with herbs or a flavored cream cheese with herbs. Congratulations on your crop. Mine is terrible! I wish you were close - I would take some off your hands. I also do this with rocotos/manzanos and they are very good. Like Maher said, clean 'em out first!

Good luck, John

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Make pepper jelly with them. Standard apple jelly recipe, with some whole ones dropped in there for decoration and heat.

I keep meaning to make Russian Roulette chocolates. One out of every box of chocolate covered caramel would have a habanero infused caramel inside. I've seen the recipe somewhere...

Give them out on Halloween (Maybe that's just me), pickle the little buggers, flavored oil/vinegars, there's a lot of options. I'd love to have a bumper crop. I only got 4 or 5 this year. Damn birds. Squirrels hate them, but they have no effect on birds.

Screw it. It's a Butterball.
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I was on a stuffed jalapeno kick a few months ago. I stuffed some with a turkey, mushroom veg mixture, cream cheese shrimp roulade, cream cheese cheddar mixture, cheese and rice, duxelle, no recipes just combine a few things from the frig and stuff away and roast.

I haven't made any but I have a friend who buys cases of the stuff and I mooch as many as I can since I can't get them locally but I love them!

Bread and Butter Jalapenos - mixed with cream cheese or peanut butter as a spread for crackers or on celery.

Edited by Kayakado (log)
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What a lovely bunch of ideas, though I shudder at the thought of de-pithing those vicious, blistering little fellows. Our huge pot is almost too big to move now, but will make its way around to the front porch on Oct. 1, to hang out as the resident "pumpkin bush" until after Halloween.

There are four flourishing plants in there, loaded with more than a hundred green little bells, some slightly yellowing in the recent cool weather. It's just beautiful when it's all laden with the golden, peachy fruit, and occasionally people walk up the driveway to get a closer look. I hope the soon-to-come frost doesn't harm its great bounty, and that we'll have it there until November.

Then we'll freeze a few to make up a little spray for next year's crops, and share the rest with neighbors and friends.

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If you have some that you really dont know what to do whit, make some pepper extract to give some heat to about anything by adding a drop. Marinate the mashed habanero in 95% ethanol for a while, then filter and let the ethanol evaporate. What you get is concentrated capsaicin : the heat molecule.

You can also use it to shut the mouth of your "There is nothing to hot for me" guests.

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Better yet, has anyone tried to eat a stuffed habenero pepper!

Bet you can only eat just one! (probably not even one.)-Dick

Yup, my hubby can eat more than one. I used to buy them by the case for my restaurant. We had some chili heads for customers, and most of them were musicians. I used to be able to eat acouple, but I think I suffered burnout...or is it burned-in?

I'd cut a slit in the side of each pepper, slip in a chunk of mozz. cheese, dip them in a batter, and deep fry them. The whole pepper would be encased in this crispy batter, the cheese melted, and the stem left as a handle. We didn't clear out the pith, but the cheese really helped!

Some of the peppers I froze for some spicy dishes. I also sliced some up into really thin slices for mah la oil. I heated up some vegtable oil until a haze forms over the surface. Slowly and gently with a mesh strainers, I'd add the habaneros, chopped garlic and shallots. The solids get crispy, and I would take it off the heat immediately. You'd need very good ventilation to make this stuff. It's incredible drizzled over chow mein noodles, fried rice, etc for a touch of heat.

Dejah

www.hillmanweb.com

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What a lovely bunch of ideas, though I shudder at the thought of de-pithing those vicious, blistering little fellows.

There are four flourishing plants in there, loaded with more than a hundred green little bells, some slightly yellowing in the recent cool weather.  It's just beautiful when it's all laden with the golden, peachy fruit,

That's one of the reasons I love chiles so much - the color.

As for de-pithing the small, hot ones, I use a tapered (serrated near the tip) grapefruit spoon.

John S.

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Better yet, has anyone tried to eat a stuffed habenero pepper!

Bet you can only eat just one! (probably not even one.)-Dick

Actually a restaurant nearby (or chain..? Left at Albequerque) used to make deep-fried habs stuffed with 3 kinds of cheese. Some chile aioli adorned the plate with the word "HOT". (They discontinued them due to lack of sales and even though they were 2.50 four or five years ago and the kitchen crew probably complained.)

A friend and I each ordered one and after my bite I was displaying all the symptoms. But after his first bite he looked at me as if I were a crybaby. Until his second bite.

His first bite was away from the placenta. Then it was my turn to laugh!

John S.

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  • 1 year later...

I wanted to bump this topic up because, due to making some Jerk over on the new Jerk Cook-off I now have an overabundance of habaneros:

gallery_56799_5925_68653.jpg

Anyone have any other creative uses for these little buggers? I sometimes make chocolates with habanero in them, and was thinking along the lines of some kind of habanero extract/essence that would allow me to control how much heat I was adding (there is so much variation in the individual peppers that I have a hard time infusing the pepper directly in the cream and getting consistent results between batches).

Chris Hennes
Director of Operations
chennes@egullet.org

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On one of the gardenweb forums I frequent there is lots of talk about this recipe for Habanero Gold which is a hot pepper jelly with habaneros and apricots. I gave the recipe to a friend who had an overabundance of habaneros and she loved it (I didn't try as I'm not a pepper jelly sort of girl)...

Emily

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  • 2 years later...

So the habaneros are going well with mangoes and apricots . . .

I've got a bumper crop of hot peppers including habaneros, and a basket of peaches from the market. I'm all salsa-ed out from the tomatoes and considering a hot sauce. Vinegar, garlic, onion, maybe some citrus.

Peter Gamble aka "Peter the eater"

I just made a cornish game hen with chestnut stuffing. . .

Would you believe a pigeon stuffed with spam? . . .

Would you believe a rat filled with cough drops?

Moe Sizlack

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The habanero pepper is usually too hot for Gringos to use in cooking unless substantially diluted. Even though i like habanero hot sauce, I don't find any particular advantage in things such as ice cream, infused vodka or fruit concoctions. To preserve, I pickle and water bath process for future use making 4 slits in each pepper for the liquid to penetrate the peppers and not leave air pockets. For hot sauce, I blend with jalapenos and age in a Harsch crock. I currently have 20l of jalapeno/habanero mash aging. This will be bottled after a few months in 'woozy's(Trade name for hot sauce bottle) and I have designed my own label after a trail run of 5l last fall. The pickled habaneros are used sparingly for heat.

One could make salsa and can but it would be too hot for most individuals.

It has been a prolific season for peppers!-Dick

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