Hot Wax & cold weather

In order to stop the house being swamped by the rapidly growing forest of chillies I’ve snuck a few more into work.

The Pimientos de Padron have been in the reception at work for some time now, basking (and on occasion baking) in the sunshine that pours through the 20ft high south facing windows.  I’ve now added to them the three chillies that I overwintered, a Friar’s Hat, an Orozco and a Cayenne.

Pimientos de Padron in the work reception.

The Friar’s Hat and the Orozco have both recovered well from their pre-Christmas pruning and are putting out plenty of new shoots and leave.  The Cayenne was somewhat slower off the mark but is now showing signs of recovery and hopefully the extra sunshine and fresh compost it’s now sitting in will encourage further growth.

Padron and Friar's Hat Chilli plants enjoying the winter sun.

Back at the end of the summer I was given some Hungarian Hot Wax Chilli fruit by my parents. Before condemning them to the frying pan I collected a mass of seed and tried planting some in November.

Nothing., nada, zero, zilch.  Not a single seedling came up so in frustration I planted the rest in a couple of small trays, maybe 80 odd seeds in all.  Of course, sod’s law, plenty of the seed sprouted this time.  Even after thinning-out I was left with over forty healthy seedlings. 

The Hungarian Hot wax is a really useful chilli, plenty of sweet flesh when green with enough heat for chutneys or pickles when ripe. Even bearing this in mind, 40 plants is still a little excessive for my small garden. I suspect that the local school fete’s plant stall will benefit from any spares but in the meantime I need to house them somewhere until they mature. With the more valuable chilli seedlings staying safely under the grow lamp, the poor old Hot Waxes have been relegated to the somewhat draftier office windowsill. Tragically this exodus has coincided with the arrival of the coldest weather this winter. We'll have to hope that they can survive, I suppose it's just as well I've grown so many now...

Hungarian Hot Wax seedlings on the windowsill.