Drying/Storing chiles?

We have 17 different chile plants and have reached the end of the growing season. How do you recommend I deal with the final harvest? Dry, freeze, roast and store under olive oil? If you suggest drying, how is that best accomplished? Also, should I only store the ripe chiles or use the green ones as well.

Thanks.

I'd roast and freeze the green chiles. The red ones I'd string up and let air dry or perhaps roast and freeze some of them.

To me, it depends on what use you wish to make of the chilies. Fresh chilies that will be puréed can be frozen will no ill effect (that's what we do with habaneros that we later use in making jerk sauce), Jalapeños can be smoked on the grill (indirect smoke only) to make oh-so-trendy chipotles and red chilies can be dried, either in a specially made dryer or in dry air. If you've got green Poblanos (or Anchos or Pasilla) that you later intend to stuff and cook, you can roast them, skin them and place them into olive oil for later use.

Mark Lipton

>If you want to reduce the heat on some you are going to dry slice them open and remove most of the seeds and white membrane before you dry them.
> Jalapenos do pickle and process nicely. I have taken some and poured the hot brine over them and instead of processing I just refrigerated them. Caution to use a good strong brine though. These I eat on the short term.
>Slice some jalapenos, remove all seeds and white membrane, flash freeze on a cookie sheet and then package in plastic bags. This gives you a wonderful sweet mild pepper to cook with that actually has no bitterness and cooks sweet. I use these with eggs.
>Lastly, I take some of the larger jalapenos and slice them down one side 10-2 o'clock, remove all the sees and membrane as best I can, and stuff them using a mixture of cream cheese, a little mayo, lots of feta and some chopped chives. I use the same freezing procedure as I do sliced jalapenos but after the initial freezing I use my vacuum sealer. These are great roasted in the oven. My deer hunting group loves them.

Two schools of thought on freezing roasted chiles: some peel and deseed the chiles before freezing, which reduces the volume; others keep the skin on and remove it after thawing (skins slip off easily after the freeze-thaw cycle) to retain more of the smokey flavor. Try both and see which you prefer.

Thanks all for your suggestions. I harvested some of the chiles today and started the drying process. I laid them out on two large racks. I may roast the next harvest. Here is a pic of todays picking.

Thanks all for your suggestions. I harvested some of the chiles today and started the drying process. I laid them out on two large racks. I may roast the next harvest. Here is a pic of todays picking.

Greg, judging by the pictures, these are VERY HOT peppers. They look like cayenne and habeneros .(sp) Both are pretty far up the scoville scale.

You're right Bob, most of them are pretty hot. I have been using them fresh through the summer in a variety of ways. I remove the ribs and seeds which reduces the heat quite a bit, but they are still hot.

Yeah, I agree with Bob. They look like habaneros and cayenne chiles, although some Thai peppers look like cayenne. After drying small chiles like these, I store them in labelled glass jars.

And, Greg, you might consider making some chile oil from some of the cayennes to use in stir-frying.

Beautiful picture of beautiful chiles, too.

Thanks, Larry. For making chile oil, what oil do you recommend? Do you "poach" the chiles in the oil or just steep them?

I take dried chiles and heat them slowly in oil until they blacken. Then I strain through a coffee filter after it's cooled. My top choices would be corn or peanut oil, but any oil should work okay. I had some commercial chile oil that used sunflower oil.