Happy New Year!

Last year I grew five varieties of chillies and five varieties of tomatoes.  Keeping my expectations to a minimum, I was very pleasantly surprised by not only the yield, but also the appearance and flavour of the fruits.  The overall result was overwhelming; and we were eating tomatoes until mid-October, and finished our last remaining chillies just before Christmas. 

This year I'm hoping to build on that success, and having gained much knowledge and hands-on experience of how to give chillies and tomatoes the best chance of growing to their full potential, I'm itching to get started. I began with a phone call to my in-laws (whose gardening knowledge far outweighs my own) to see just how early I can get the propagators out, and sow my first seeds.  For the last couple of years I've left the propagating until about mid-March; having no heated greenhouse I've made do with heat from the sunlight coming through my kitchen window; but January and February aren't exactly the best months to rely on such a method!  So, whilst it's convenient for Allen (my father-in-law) to get started with sowing his seeds of choice, it's best that I stick with March to kick things off. 

At present I'm flicking through catalogues and searching online for chilli and tomato seeds, hoping to find more unusual and interesting varieties, suitable for growing in West Yorkshire, and without the aid of a heated greenhouse.  Last year I was surprised at how well my Super-Hot chillies grew on my patio - in fact the ones I grew outside were superior to the ones I grew under-cover in my planthouse!  Obviously, the ones I grew indoors were the best; they ripened beautifully and were blisteringly hot and flavoursome.  But some of the ones I grew outside ripened well, and their flavour was rivalled only by the Paper Lanterns I grew indoors on our bedroom window. 

Whilst trawling the internet for advice about growing chillies, I came across this interesting link:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4b/PepperswithscovilleCentralMarketHoustonTX.JPG

The Scoville Scale measures the heat and piquancy of chillies.  The scale is named after an American Chemist, Wilber Scoville, who came up with a method of measuring the capsaicinoid content of chilli peppers.  He named his method  the Scoville Organoleptic Test, and below is an extract from Wikipedia which explains the test:

"In Scoville's method, an alcohol extract of the capsaicin oil from a measured amount of dried pepper is added incrementally to a solution of sugar in water until the "heat" is just detectable by a panel of (usually five) tasters; the degree of dilution gives its measure on the Scoville scale. Thus a sweet pepper or a bell pepper, containing no capsaicin at all, has a Scoville rating of zero, meaning no heat detectable. The hottest chilis, such as habaneros and nagas, have a rating of 200,000 or more, indicating that their extract must be diluted over 200,000 times before the capsaicin presence is undetectable. The greatest weakness of the Scoville Organoleptic Test is its imprecision, because it relies on human subjectivity. Tasters taste only one sample per session."

I thought the picture was quite funny!