That is easily the best of the Asian types I’ve grown. Vigorous and productive and great eating.
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That’s great news! As I mentioned, first time growing. Everything I’ve seen seems like they’re pretty similar to growing peppers so hopefully I don’t mess it up too much.
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Eggplants are a little more challenging (at least for me), but I’ve found that if I don’t plant too early (better to size up a seedling in a pot and not plant too early) and keep the flea beetles off them at least while they’re young, they do well. I use surround on my young eggplants and it seems to do a pretty good job keeping the flea beetles off.
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Sunrise Sauce is a staple for us. Very good!
If we’re only talking about tomatoes and peppers in this thread; here’s our list for this year. Multiple plants of each, of course because one is none and two is one, yada yada. 
We don’t grow eggplant.
Pepper - Capsicum Chinense
Khang Starr Orange Flame
Scotch Bonnet Red
Jamaican Scotch Bonnet Yellow
Biquinho Yellow
Trinidad Perfume
7Pot Primo
Fatalii Yellow
Naga Viper Brain
Big Black Mama
Helios Habanero
Pepper - Capsicum Annuum
Klari Baby Cheese
Golden Nugget
Red Rocket Cayenne
Time Bomb
Lola Banana
Goddess Banana
Everman Jalapeno
Farmer’s Market Jalapeno
Big Jim
Jimmy Nardello
Khang Starr Chocolate StarrScream
Golden Cayenne
Pepper - Capsicum Baccatum
Malawian Piquante Peppadew
Sugar Rush Peach
Pepper - Capsicum Hybrid
Blood Bhut Jolokia
Pepper - Capsicum Frutescens
CC Piri Piri
Tomato - Cherry Indeterminate
Jasper Cherry
White Cherry
TY Yellow Mini
Honey Bee
Tomato - Indeterminate
New Girl
Blush
Fourth of July
RuBee Dawn F1
Lemon Boy
Chocolate Stripes
Tomato - Determinate
Sunrise Sauce
Tiren Sauce
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SO yall got me into the start my garden mode.
i have 3 garden areas because the smaller side gardens get hotter then the front unfenced garden area .feb 27,2025
so i started 300 tooth ache plants . “spilanthes, jambú”
35 turnips " first yr growing"
tomatoes
florida everglade " spoon "
totem , alaska silver fir. Glacier and brandy wine " all slicers i like to sun dry in the green house"
Italian Roma
broccoli cauliflower peas beans all colder plants for now .
the toothache plant i use for stings cuts and bruises it numbs pain . so here for me that’s a must have plant t
too many to list spices and herbs all culinary
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I just started the seeds for this year. This would be the first year I’m trying out new-to-me tomato varieties beside our usual annual standard cherry tomatoes.
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I’ll take any tips for getting chinensis peppers sprouting faster (or sprouting, period). I have a heat mat and an aquarium, I try to keep the temp at 90ish and humidity around 50%. Typically get a few spikes to 95 F, some occasional dips to high 70s.
I’ve always struggled with these and don’t know if I am doing something wrong. My germination rates tend to be rather poor. I never let the soil dry out but try to avoid water logging (use a spritzer). I am using fancy potting soil this time (fox farm ocean/forest blend).
Do chinensis seeds remain viable for less time, compared to other species? Maybe that’s the issue I’m having. I know these take longer to sprout, but my issue is that they don’t sprout at all.
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I started germinating in a little ziplock on a moist paper towel. then potting after they sprout. No heat mat for me anymore.
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I havent sprouted alot of chinensis, but the ones I have I didn’t do anything special for. I just put them in a little seed starting tray with a humidity dome and bottom water. No heat for me.
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Similar to me but I set a heat mat at 78F and it stays very consistent.
If @MaracujA you in the 90s that may be too warm.
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Interesting. I’ve read chinensis requires warmer temps up to 95 but it’s sounding like I might have better success at a lower temp. Will try! Thanks
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I have poorer germination rate on tomatoes and peppers in the summer than I do the rest of the year, and we are in the 90s basically all season long. So they may not germinate if its consistantly too hot.
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Tomatoes
-Cherry type- I am trying out different red cherries since the super sweet 100’s tend to crack easily. I am set on growing out the eagle smiley and black cherry every year though, since they grew so well even in the drought we had and did not crack. The flavors are also great, with black cherry having a fruits and sweet taste and Smiley having a sweet and savory taste close to sungold.
Camp joy
Dwarf eagle smiley
Black cherry
Brandy sweet plum
-Dwarf slicing- I dont eat a ton of slicing tomatoes, so I grow dwarves for this purpose. Lemon ice is my favorite tomato, but tasmanian chocolate is a better producer and is almost just as good. They are both umami bombs. I have heard good things about rosella purple and sweet scarlet, so i am testing them this year.
Lemon ice
Tasmanian chocolate
Rosella purple
Sweet scarlet
- sauce/ multi purpose- these I will use for salsa and sauce generally, but I also give these to people who are scared of tomatoes that are not red. Rutgers 250 is a great all around tomato, and I think it is an improvement on the O.G rutgers because of it’s resistance to disease and it’s productivity. Flavor is on par with great slicing tomates, with a nice amount of acid. Cooks to a great sauce. I am trialing Heidi, which is supposed to be a productive and resilient tomato, and anna russian, which I hope has the flavor of Lemon Ice since it is an ancestor, or at least anna bannana is.
Rutgers 250
Heidi
Anna russian
-Peppers- I generally make sauce and powder with my peppers and I smoke a bunch too. Zapotec is a great jalapeño for smoking, the corking lends itself well to the flavors. Anaheim is good for pickles and stuffing, much like wax peppers. Serrano is a great pepper for salsa. Habanada is a highly flavored pepper that lets me adjust the heat better. 7 pot is the tastiest chinense pepper I have had, but they are inedible raw since the last time I had one I thought it burnt a hole in my stomach. Sugar rush makes excellent pickles. The shishito and nardello are used as frying peppers.
I really like making pickled peppers in oil, mama lil’s style. Take the red ripe peppers, like wax or jalapeno, and cut them into your preffered shape. Pack them into a jar or a separate container. Bring enough vinegar to to a near boil in order to cover the peppers. Add salt to taste and a pinch of sugar. Pour the vinegar over the peppers and let them quick pickle. Let them sit for a day or two and then dump the vinegar. You can save the vinegar for “pepper water” or use it as a base for a carolina style barbacue sauce. Then, pour in olive oil or vegetable oil mixed with olive oil and let the peppers sit for a few more days. I like to add garlic and oregano. For food safety, this should be refrigerated.
Zapotec jalapeño
Anaheim
Serrano
Habanada
Hot Cherry
Hot wax
Sugar rush peach
7 pot chocolate
Jimmy nardello
Shishito
-eggplant- this is the first year I am growing them. I plan on trellising them like my tomatoes, so i chose small fruited varieties. I just picked up what was on the shelf. My favorite way to eat eggplant is stewwed with tomatoes. Eggplant parm is great, but I dont like the greasiness that comes with frying so I just salt them and let the water come out and then Iroast them to dry them out. I finish by stewing them with some sauce and top with cheese. They are also great cubed and stewed with squash, or when put with everything you are growing and roasted on a sheet pan as a garden bake.
White knight
Green knight
Long purple
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Huh, I have a Zapotec tomato.
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potting soil mist with a paper towel in a plastic bag and out in the seeds then over the VCR i did this to get my palm trees started worked great,
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95 degrees sounded a little high to me so I looked it up. This is from the Trade Winds Fruit site.
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For some reason I wrote down (don’t remember source) that chinense ideal temp goes a little higher than other peppers, to 95. Maybe I dreamed it. In any case, I am also thinking it’s a little hot (based on reports here), and at lease we can say Trade Winds doesn’t differentiate between pepper species.
Thanks for posting!
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I’ll put in a couple Better Boy plants, but tomatoes have proven very difficult here in upstate SC. Blight and wilt almost every year. Better Boy has proven the toughest under our conditions. I’ll put in a few jalapeno plants. They do well here, and bear heavily. I ripen a bunch of them in the fall and smoke them for chipotles.
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Supersonic.
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