Peppers

  A Must With Turnip Greens is Pepper Sauce

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 This is something that I make every summer, into the fall. The Tabasco peppers will always bear until frost. The plants are so pretty, with the yellow, orange and red Tabasco peppers. They are even pretty planted in pots as if it was a flower. Many restaurants have the peppers in small bottles that resemble in shape of a budvase. I have never found a container that would seal properly shaped in that manner. I use the small jelly jars to seal my pepper sauce.

Peppers of any kind are very easy to pickle. Jalapenos, Longhorn, Cheyenne, Chili, Cherry, Hot Banana and Banana can be done using the same method. I often mix all of them together. Mixing them makes the sealed jars look like home decorations; setting on a shelf or in cabinet. I have an old pie safe left open to display mine. This particular pie safe has one side that is covered with screen, somewhat like an old screen door would have. I enter them in the North Alabama State Fair each year; the jars with ribbons are on the top.
Jalapenos are a must for me when I fix Mexican food. Nachos are not the same without lots of peppers. The alum is what makes them crispy. I also slice the Hot Banana to put on baked potatoes. This is the pepper that in grocery stores is commonly labeled as pepper rings. This adds flavor to a potato without adding the calories that butter and sour cream add.
Banana peppers can be put in jars whole as well.
I also grow Bell Peppers, but treat them totally different that all of the above. Bell Peppers in the winter are crazy expensive. I think it is a must to have Bell Pepper in chili and spaghetti. To have enough for this in the winter without giving $1.49 or more for one pepper I freeze them whole. Wash them and put them in a big Ziploc bag. They can be cut frozen and are not the same texture as fresh, but for cooking they work great. Even if you want to add them as a topping along with onions for a hamburger steak.

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Recipe Pickled Peppers

6 qts. peppers

1 c. salt

1/2 c. sugar

1 qt. vinegar

2 qts. Water

1 tsp. alum

(optional- small green tomatoes)

*The tomatoes will take away some of the heat.

The amount does not matter. I just mix them in with the peppers

Bring vinegar, salt, and water to a hard boil. Add alum when after hard boil begins. Wash and pack peppers in jars with 2 cloves garlic, if desired, in each jar. Pour vinegar mixture over peppers and seal.

*Any size jar is fine. Pints are good for the sliced Banana. The small jelly jars are best for the Tabasco peppers. Quarts are good for the ones that have all different peppers mixed in them. I have even put them in half gallon jars.

The half gallon jars that I have are what syrup came in. My grandmother called them syrup jugs. She loved them for green beans.