Harlequin's Gardens

70-80 Days, Open Pollinated, Heirloom, Very Mild Heat
Also known as “Cuban pepper” and “Italian frying pepper”, Cubanelle is a variety of sweet pepper with just a touch of heat (-1000 on the Scoville scale), commonly used in Cuban, Puerto Rican and Dominican cuisines. When unripe, the 6-8” fruit is light yellowish-green, but turns bright red if allowed to ripen. Prized for its sweet, mild flesh, rich flavor, and pretty colors. Cubanelle is thin-walled, especially suited for quick cooking and has a low water content. Best picked when yellow-green for use in roasting, stuffing, pizza topping, frying, a substitute for Anaheims, or in a yellow mole, and is one of the traditional ingredients in sofrito.

75 days, Open-pollinated, Sweet
Amazingly sweet, fruity flavor makes these heirloom peppers tempting and delightful eaten straight off the plant, but traditional Italian cuisine typically uses them for frying. The long, slender, wrinkled fruit will easily reach 6–9 inches starting green and ripening to red on super productive, disease- resistant plants that are widely adapted. Its especially rich flavor has earned Jimmy Nardello’s placement in “The Ark of Taste” by Slow Food USA. If you happen to grow Hot Portugal pepper, make sure you label your plants well-
-Hot Portugal is a twin in every way except the hotness!

70 days, Open Pollinated
Reliable yields of large sweet blocky bells turn from green to red; prolific yields even in short-season areas and cool climates.

70-90 days, Open-pollinated
Marconi Rosso is a large sweet pepper growing to 8” long and 3” wide. The green fruits ripen to deep red and are delicious at all stages. Incredibly sweet and beautiful, these long, slim peppers with medium-thick walls and sweet skin are the gourmet’s choice. They are excellent raw, roasted, grilled and stuffed. The plants are 4’ tall by 1.5 to 2’ wide, fast-growing and prolific.

90 days, Open Pollinated, Heirloom
These little, thin-walled 1-2” bell peppers ripen to gold or red. They make colorful stuffed appetizers, and are great for pickling. Several of the short, stout, productive plants can be grown together in a large pot. Paradoxically, though small-fruited, they ripen fairly late.

75 days, Open-pollinated, Heirloom
Yields of 1–1.5” fruit could be described as “ever-bearing”. Small plants produce dozens of these pretty, round, flattened fruit turning from green to red. Flavor is fine and they are ideal for canning, pickling, or stuffing.

70 -80 days, Open Pollinated
This early and productive bell pepper bears up to a dozen thick-walled 6-8” tapered fruits; ripening from green to chocolate-brown with gorgeous burgundy flesh inside, really delicious rich flavor, and good juicy crunch! Eve’s favorite!

Heirloom 70 Days
Sheepnose is a super-sweet heirloom pimento-type pepper from Ohio. The beautiful, thick-walled, crisp, juicy fruits ripen from green to red and are shaped like little pumpkins (or wheels of cheese, or the noses of sheep), flattened, ribbed globes, 3-4” diameter and 2.5-3” tall. They keep for a long time in the fridge, if you can resist enjoying them raw, on pizza, in pasta, casseroles, antipasto or salad, roasted, sautéed, etc. They are a classic sweet pepper for canning. Plants are small (1-2’ tall), easy to grow, and heavy-yielding. They can be grown in patio containers.

60 days, Open Pollinated
This early, small, mild, thin-walled glossy green pepper is popular in Japan, where they are pan-fried and salted and served as an appetizer or side-dish. The thin walls blister and char easily when roasted or grilled, taking on a rich flavor that’s delicious with coarse salt and lemon juice! The fruits grow up to 3-4″ long. The plant has a spreading habit and produces very prolifically. The peppers are typically harvested and used green, but eventually turns orange and red with sweeter flavor. Shishito can be grown successfully in large containers.

85 days, Open Pollinated
A very popular chile. Medium-hot large 8” fruits are excellent roasted and stuffed for chile rellenos.

70-75 days, Open-pollinated, Very Hot
Also called ‘Shipkas’, Bulgarian Carrot Peppers are rumored to have been smuggled out of Russia during the late 1980s, making their way through Europe, the Caribbean, and then the United States. They’re great for salsa, chutney, roasting, stir fry, and grilling.  The prolific plant is about 18” tall, and the bright orange, 3-4”-long ‘carrots’ have a crunchy texture and sweet and tangy flavor, and they produce a burst of heat that measures 20,000 – 30,000 Scoville units. They ripen from green to yellow, and then finally orange. This plant does well in areas with cool nights, like ours!

65 days, Heirloom, Medium hot, 4,000 – 5,000 SHU
This famous New Mexico heirloom chile is from the farming town of Chimayo in northern New Mexico, at 5,900′ elevation. Its great flavor is the result of hand selection over hundreds of years. The 6-7” long fruit are probably the earliest Southwestern chile to ripen to red. They are thin-skinned and dry quickly in the sun. Allow the chiles to remain on the plant and mature until almost completely red. This native strain has fantastic red chile flavor and makes great chile powder and sauces for enchiladas, burritos, etc. At first it tastes sweet and then medium hot. Since it’s not too hot, you can use it in large quantities and achieve flavor nirvana, not heat nirvana. A Renewing America’s Food Traditions variety listed with the Ark of Taste as a threatened American food tradition.

63-65 days, Open Pollinated, 2,500-5,000 SHU
Early Jalapeno is a medium-hot pepper and the best Jalapeno variety for an early crop. The short, blunt 2 to 2.5” peppers are thick-walled and juicy. Early Jalapeno will reportedly set fruit under cooler conditions than other Jalapeno varieties. Red, fully ripe fruits are both slightly sweeter and spicier. The stocky 2-foot tall plants will not fall over or break branches.

85 days, Open-pollinated, Low-Medium heat
The Guajillo chile is the dried form of the Mirasol pepper. It is the one of the most popular chiles grown in Mexico, with a raisin-like wrinkled texture, and the 2^nd most popular dried chile. The Guajillo has sweet, fruity tones, and then it hits you with a savory heat of 2,000 to 5,000 Scoville units. The fruits grow to 3-6” long and just over an inch wide, standing upright on the plant, with the plant growing about 2’tall. In Mexico, Guajillo chiles are dried first as whole pods, crushed to a powder to make a seasoning paste. This is used to create very flavorful mole sauces, salsas, sauces, spiced cocoa and chocolate, marinades, spice rubs, and more. 

90-120 days, Heirloom, 200,000 to 325,000 SHU
By popular demand: one of the most blisteringly fiery peppers, from 200,000 to 325,000 Scoville’s (compare with Early Jalapeno at 4,000 to 6,500 Scoville!). Small plants to 18” tall will set 10-20 pendulous dark green fruits which mature to bright orange. Great for greenhouse and container growing. Likes night-time temperatures 70 degrees and above. Key ingredient in West Indian jerk sauce.

72 days, Heirloom, 2,500 – 10,000 SHU
Perhaps the world’s best known, most versatile and most popular hot pepper, the Jalapeno pepper originated in Jalapa, Veracruz, Mexico. Smoked and dried jalapenos are called chipotles. The blunt, tapered, 3” by 1” fruits are usually used when dark green; they turn red (and hotter) when mature. They have thick walls and do not dry well as whole peppers, but are excellent for canning, pickling or used fresh in salsas and many other Latin American and Southeast Asian dishes. The plants are erect and sturdy and although very productive, generally do not require caging or other support.

85+ days, Open Pollinated
Unique, brilliant scarlet, small, pendant peppers shaped like flaring bells are gracefully borne mostly on the main stem of tall, exceptionally pretty plants. Flesh of the fruits is tasty and mildly piquant, seeds and ribs are hotter. Traditionally used to season pasta dishes, but they’re so ornamental, we recommend growing some for arranging in a vase too! If season is cut short, harvested green they will ripen to scarlet quickly indoors. We grow ours 2 to a big pot – some years the plants have reached over 5′ tall and born over 90 peppers! Original seed brought to Eve from Italy.

70-80 days, Heirloom
A New Mexico heirloom that produces long, smooth, pendant fruits with a mildly hot flavor that ripens green to red. Loves the hot days and cool nights of New Mexico and Colorado. Vigorous, compact plants have heavy foliage that prevents sunscald. Performs well in containers.

75 days, Open Pollinated, 500 – 2,500 SHU
An 8”-long, thick-walled, mildly hot Anaheim type pepper excellent for stuffing or roasting.  Turns red when mature and is used in New Mexico for dried pepper wreaths and ristras. A unique feature of this pepper is its incredible continuing production after the initial harvest.

78 days, Open Pollinated
Easy, prolific 4-8″ long dark brown, smoky, fruity, a ‘secret’ ingredient in award-winning chili.

70 Days, Open Pollinated, 30,000 to 50,000 SHU
A twist on the classic Cayenne pepper, this exceptionally ornamental pepper is one of the hottest Cayennes, with excellent flavor. Elegant 2’ tall plants are covered with dozens and dozens of light purple blossoms which turn into dark purple, thin peppers about 3” long, a bit smaller than a regular cayenne, that eventually ripen to deep red. They can be used fresh, pickled, dried, or ornamentally, as hot pepper flakes, in salsa or hot sauce, and in countless Latin American, Indian, Caribbean, African and Asian dishes. Eve has enjoyed growing Purple Cayenne in a 16” diameter pot in her front yard.

80-90 days, Heirloom,  2,500 to 5,000 SHU
Named for its pretty, cherry-like shape and color, Hot Cherry produces medium-heat peppers with a slightly sweet taste. They are very fleshy and juicy, perfect for pickling or stuffing. The 1” to 2” wide fruits grow on full, bushy, plants and mature from green to red when they have developed their full flavor. Frequent harvesting through summer will maximize the plant’s yield.

75 days green, 100 red, Open pollinated, Hot
A small fruited Serrano pepper from the mountains of the Huasteca region on the Gulf coast side of Mexico. It produces flavorful, hot, dark green, 2-2 1/2” fruit even in cool summers. Serrano peppers are popular for their productivity and diverse utility in the kitchen, and are used almost as much in Mexican cuisine as jalapeños. Fairly juicy considering their small size, they are used in Mexican hot sauces and pico de gallo.

85 days, Heirloom
Imported to the US in 1846 from Tabasco, Mexico, this pepper made its way to Avery Island, LA, where the McIlhenny family used it in a hot sauce that became so popular and famous that now Tabasco sauce is synonymous with hot sauce. The 2”-long, tapered Tabasco is a very hot pepper, borne in copious quantities on a short, compact plant.