The Pepper Garden: How to Grow Peppers from the Sweetest Bell to the Hottest Habanero

by Dave DeWitt, Paul W. Bosland

You can grow and enjoy chile peppers, whether you live in the tropics or in colder northern climates. This guide tells you everything you need to know, including recommendations for which ones to grow and botanical descriptions of the most popular types. The authors are pepper experts and offer all of their tips and techniques for choosing good seed, starting your plants out right, and planting your garden with companion plants that are good to eat with peppers - such as tomatoes, onions, corn, basil, oregano, and garlic.

Easy step-by-step instructions, a list of seed sources, and a glossary of terms will help the gardening novice, and there are full details on harvesting the pods; drying and roasting peppers; and making festive ristras (hanging strands of red peppers). Whether you are an avid gardener or a chile pepper lover wanting to grow your favorites, The Pepper Garden will be your guide to successful pepper gardening.

Genres: Gardening, Nonfiction, Cooking, Food

240 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1993

About the author

The New York Times calls this author "The Pope of Peppers" and TV viewers recognize Dave DeWitt as the ever-affable chile pepper expert and organizer of Albuquerque's huge annual National Fiery Foods and Barbecue Show. Dave is also the author of more than 40 food related books, including the best-selling "The Complete Chile Pepper Book," "The Southwest Table," and the forthcoming "Growing Medical Marijuana."
National TV appearances include "American Journal," Cable News Network, "The Today Show," "Home with Gary Collins," "Scientific American Frontiers," "Smart Solutions," and "CBS Sunday Morning." He has also been featured in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, American Way, Smithsonian, and approximately 200 newspapers across the country.
Now, the world's authority on the Southwest's hottest food turns his attention to New Mexicos most compelling and legendary historical figures--the rag-tag group of Apache warriors led by an elderly gentleman set on avenging the death of Victorio--and those who pursued them, the officers and buffalo soldiers of the U.S. Army's Ninth Cavalry as told in Dave's novel "Avenging Victorio."
The people, the story and the settings are real; DeWitt poured through endless documentation in the form of military records, old photos, newspaper clippings, letters and other correspondence to piece together the facts. Then, drawing on his background as a university professor of composition and literature-- plus his almost uncanny grasp and sensibility of Apache customs, traditions, rituals (and humor) -- DeWitt has woven a fast-paced and engaging saga. Click here for more information."

Reviews

[audrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

You may think you're serious about growing peppers, but that's because you haven't read this book. The author is very serious about growing peppers (and classifying them, protecting them from pests, making home decor out of them but also and mainly growing them some more), and is also good at writing about growing peppers.

I love growing peppers, and I am entirely confident that next year's peppers will be a better crop, based on what I learned from this book.

There are times the author's tone gets a bit fussy, but in kind of an exasperated will-you-just-listen-to-me-about-how-this-goes? kind of way that remained entertaining.

Also this sentence about the great 1898 wilding of pepper-obsessed botanists needs framing: "Around the turn of the century, botanists were having a field day cataloguing the bewildering number of varieties of peppers."

So. If you are very much into growing peppers -- as opposed to being a pepper-growing dilettante, say -- you will find this book immensely enjoyable.

[Dianne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my favorite reference books. A good overview of growing peppers

[Liz · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book to be a fairly good in-depth primer on growing all different types of peppers. The authors are definitely not strictly organic, but do provide organic ideas alongside the non-organic ones. The information on different types of peppers is especially thorough, and covers a wider variety of them than I've seen in any other book I've yet read. I would recommend it to others who want to read in-depth coverage of peppers.

As I understand it, the authors are soon coming out with a revised edition (under a slightly different title, I believe - something like The Chile Pepper Garden).

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book I picked up in Westchester, PA from a used shop in the shape of a barn. I'll have to revisit the shop to see what other gems they have on their gardening shelves!

[John Anderson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good info on growing peppers.