Beautiful mild Black Hungarian pepper

Hungarian Black is an heirloom pepper. It grows on big three feet tall plants with lots of dark green leafy vegetation. Grow this pepper in full sun as an ornamental and for eating. Both Seed Savers and Baker Creek say this is jalapeno shaped, but you can see what it looked like in my garden. The plant is a little bigger than the TAM jalapeno growing right beside it.

The peppers in my garden have wider shoulders and are more cone shaped. Because it is an heirloom and kind of hard to find, you may want to save some seed from your late harvest. Leave a couple of peppers on the plant to fully mature for seed saving.

In the heat debate online, you can read that this pepper is mildly hot or medium hot. I am not a fan of hotter-than-hades peppers. I wanted to grow a spicy, but not too hot pepper.

Hungarian Black has only a suggestion of heat. In fact, in a recipe, hubby thought it was just another color bell pepper. I was looking for the heat when I tasted it fresh. There is a hint of heat but I wouldn't have noticed if I was't looking for it. To me, that is a mild pepper.

Photographers will love the beautiful purple flowers. During our heat wave of days and days of 100 degree plus days, the pepper did not produce a single fruit. To be fair, none of my peppers, sweet or hot, produce during a heat wave.

Start seed indoors under grow lights or in the aerogarden 8 or 10 weeks after the last frost date in your area. Keep temps around 75 degrees for the seed to germinate. Be patient and keep seed evenly moist but not wet. Plant outdoors in full sun two weeks after you plant tomato seedlings.

Acclimate plants to outdoors by hardening them off for about 10 days. Do not fertilize until after the first fruit set. Soils should be at least 65 degrees.

If we have a terribly hot summer again, the best I can do is to keep watering daily and hope the plants survive till the heat wave breaks. The pepper plants will produce heavily again when the heat wave breaks. They will continue fruiting until first frost.

I bought my seed from Baker Creek. Use these peppers as you would any bell pepper, though the walls are thinner and not as juicy. They are beautiful. Hungarian Black are perfect for salads, stuffed or cooked in any recipe calling for mild or bell peppers.

I love to use peppers in slow cooked winter dishes like stew and chili. Save some of your harvest for winter, when grocery store prices skyrocket. Simply chop to the size you will use most in cooking.

Freeze chopped pepper and store in a heavy plastic bag. If you use a plastic container, it will absorb the odor of the peppers. Add frozen chopped pepper directly to the recipe. No need to thaw first.

Soil not warming up fast enough? Cover garden area with black plastic. First, amend the soil and add organic matter. Once the soil is ready for planting cover with black plastic.