Jalapeño

• 1. Introduction

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  The jalapeño takes its name from Xalapa, the capital city of Veracruz, Mexico, yet the pepper is not grown in or around that city. Popular belief gets this wrong, and the mismatch is only the first oddity. The jalapeño is a medium-sized chili pepper, a pod type within the species Capsicum annuum. Its fruit can hang from a plant as a mild green pod or a fiery red one, sometimes on the very same plant. How did a pepper end up named for a place that never farmed it? What makes one pod barely tingle and another burn? And what does it take to carry this crop from a field to a plate safely?

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• 2. Aztec Markets

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  Bernardino de Sahagún wrote of Aztec markets in the Florentine Codex, and his account includes stalls selling chipotles, which are smoked jalapeños. The same markets offered mole made from chipotles, alongside fresh chilies. That record shows jalapeños were in use before the Spanish conquest.

  Genetic analysis adds another layer. It places the jalapeño as a distinct clade, a branch with no close sisters that are not directly descended from jalapeños themselves.

  Still, the deep past of the pod type remains uncertain. Peppers have been used in the Americas for thousands of years, and smoking some varieties to preserve them is part of that old practice. Whether the jalapeño clade and pod type existed at any given early moment would require well preserved samples and genetic testing to settle.

  The pepper has carried several other names. Huachinango refers to the ripe red jalapeño. Chile gordo means fat chili pepper, and cuaresmeño is another name for the same fruit.

  The link to Xalapa comes through Vicente Jiménez, who invented the process of pickling and canning the peppers in that city. That invention, not any local field, ties the pepper to its namesake.

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• 3. Growing Conditions

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  A jalapeño plant needs 70 to 80 days to complete its growing period, and by maturity it stands 70 to 90 centimeters tall. A typical plant bears 25 to 35 pods, and growers pick it several times over a season. A mature pod measures 5 to 10 centimeters long and 25 to 38 millimeters wide, and it hangs downward. Most are picked and eaten green. Some are left to ripen to red, orange, or yellow, and the red color seen in sriracha sauce comes from peppers that turn as the season ends. A picked pepper may even redden on its own. Compared with the similar serrano, the jalapeño is wider and generally milder.

  Seeds germinate best at 29 degrees Celsius. At that temperature, half of them sprout within 4 to 5 days depending on cultivar and seed lot, which is quicker than cayenne. Germination worsens above 30 degrees and nearly stops at 40.

  The plant prefers warm climates, provided it gets enough water. It wants a soil pH between 4.5 and 7.0, soil that drains well, and at least 6 to 8 hours of sunlight a day.

  Nitrogen needs set jalapeños apart from bell peppers. Experiments show pod production suffers below 7.5 millimolar nitrogen. The best result comes at 15 to 22 millimolar, where the plant grows more leaves and more pods rather than leaves alone.

  Although growers usually treat it as an annual, the plant is a perennial. Protected from frost, it can produce across several years.

  Over-watering invites trouble. Root rot and foliar blight are both often caused by Phytophthora capsici, a fungus that grows best in warm, wet conditions. Crop rotation helps. Breeders have also developed resistant strains, such as NuMex Vaquero and TAM Mild Jalapeño, because the damage matters commercially throughout the world.

  The wider list of threats includes Verticillium wilt, powdery mildew, ripe rot, soft rot, Beet curly top virus, Tobacco mosaic virus, and root-knot nematode. Breeders answer many of these threats in the seed itself, which is where the next question of cost and choice arises.

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• 4. Heat and Corking

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  On the Scoville scale, jalapeños usually register between 4,000 and 8,500 units. Across all growing conditions, a pod can range from a few thousand units to more than 10,000. Even fruit from the same plant can differ in heat.

  Ripeness matters. Red jalapeños are generally hotter than green ones of the same variety, because pungency rises as the pepper ripens.

  Stress matters too. Salty water, erratic watering, swings in temperature or light, poor soil nutrition, insects, and illness all push pungency upward.

  Small brown lines on the skin, called corking, offer a clue. They are scars, and they correlate with heat, since the conditions that raise heat also cause scarring. American consumers consider corking unattractive. In other markets it is a favored trait, particularly in pickled or oil-preserved jalapeños.

  Breeders have pulled the range in both directions. TAM Milds and Dulcito sit on the low side of the heat range. Grande is bred to run hot. Sweet hybrids go further, keeping the look and flavor of a jalapeño with no heat at all.

  The source of the burn is physical. Capsaicin and related compounds gather in vesicles in the placenta membrane surrounding the seeds. The vesicles look white or yellow, and under violet light they fluoresce between 530 and 600 nanometers.

  Fresh peppers can irritate the skin, eyes, lips, and other membranes. Some sensitive people wear latex or vinyl gloves while handling them. Washing the oils off with hot soapy water and applying vegetable oil to the skin may help. Hands that have touched jalapeños should stay away from the eyes, which leads to burning and redness.

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• 5. Hybrids and Seeds

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  Four categories cover most jalapeño breeds: F1 hybrids, cultivars stabilized at the F-11 or F-12 generation or later, landraces, and F2 hybrids. F1 hybrids come from parent plants that are hand-emasculated and cross-bred, which gives uniform offspring with hybrid vigor.

  Those F1 hybrids deliver the highest and most uniform yields, but the seed costs 25 times as much as open-pollinated seed. As a result, only 2% of American jalapeño farmland is planted with them.

  F2 hybrids often produce similarly. A cheaper route exists, though. Some F1 hybrids are made with recessive male sterility, which removes the need for hand pollination and lowers the price, but the F2 generation then loses 25% of its yield.

  Cultivars are researched and created to promote chosen traits. Breeders select for resistance to viruses and other pepper diseases, milder fruit, early ripening, and higher yields. They also select for a more attractive pod in terms of size, wall thickness, and corking.

  Land-grant universities and the Chile Pepper Institute promote cultivars as the most sustainable and environmentally safe form of disease control. They judge it best both economically and over the long term.

  Notable cultivars include Early Jalapeño, TAM Mild Jalapeño II, TAM Veracruz, the yellow TAM Jaloro, the colorful NuMex Piñata, TAM Dulcito, Waialua, Biker Billy, and NuMex Primavera.

  Notable F1 hybrids include Mitla, Perfecto, Tula, Sayula, Senorita, and Torreon. Most of them, from Mitla to Torreon, were developed and marketed by Petoseed, a brand of Seminis.

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• 6. Fields and Markets

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  In 1999, roughly 107,000 acres of Mexican land were dedicated to jalapeño production. By 2011 that had fallen to 101,000 acres. Output nonetheless climbed by 1.5% a year, thanks to more irrigation, greenhouses, better equipment, deeper knowledge, and improved techniques.

  Jalapeños account for thirty percent of Mexico's chili production. In 2009, the country produced 619,000 tons. Chihuahua supplied 42% of that crop, Sinaloa 12.9%, Jalisco 6.6%, and Michoacán 6.3%.

  One company dominates the trade. La Costeña controls about 60% of the world market. By its own published figures, it exports 16% of the peppers Mexico produces, which is an 80% share of the 20% that Mexico exports in total. The United States imports 98% of La Costeña's exports.

  Inside the United States, the USDA reports that California has grown the most jalapeños since 2010, followed by New Mexico and Texas. Together they produced 462.5 million pounds of peppers in 2014. China, Peru, Spain, and India also grow commercial chilies, including jalapeños.

  Accurate numbers are hard to find. Growers are not fond of keeping and sharing such data, and reporting agencies often lump all green chilies together, or all hot chilies, without separating pod types.

  One New Mexico figure shows what processing adds. In 2002 the state's jalapeño crop was worth $3 million at the farm gate and $20 million after processing.

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• 7. After the Harvest

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  Held at 7.5 degrees Celsius, harvested jalapeños keep for up to 3 to 5 weeks. They give off 0.1 to 0.2 microliters of ethylene per kilogram per hour, very little for a chili, and they do not respond to ethylene treatment. To finish ripening picked peppers, processors hold them at 20 to 25 degrees with high humidity. A dip in water at 55 degrees for 4 minutes kills molds without harming the fruit.

  Most jalapeños never reach shoppers fresh. The majority are wet processed, canned, or pickled right after harvest for use in mixes, prepared foods, and salsas.

  That preservation carries a warning. With a pH of 4.8 to 6.0, jalapeños are a low-acid food. If canned or pickled peppers look gassy or mushy, grow mold, or smell disagreeable, special precautions are needed to avoid botulism. Packing in calcium chloride firms up the peppers and adds calcium, whether or not they are also pickled.

  In 2008, fresh jalapeños from Mexico tested positive for Salmonella. The FDA came to believe the peppers were responsible for much of that year's salmonellosis outbreak in the United States. Contaminated irrigation water and processing water are the two most common routes of contamination, and both were at fault in 2008.

  The outbreak sparked research into detecting pathogens on jalapeños, into how often and how foodborne illness arises from them, and into prevention.

  Jalapeños have microbial properties similar to tomatoes. The outer layer of the skin shelters pathogens, and a damaged or chopped pepper gives them a medium to grow in. Washing matters at both the farm and the household level, yet without cold storage it cannot stop the spread.

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• 8. From Plate to Pop Culture

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  A raw jalapeño is 92% water, 6% carbohydrate, and 1% protein, with negligible fat. A 100 gram serving supplies 29 kilocalories. It is a rich source of vitamin C, vitamin B6, and vitamin E, and a moderate source of vitamin K.

  The kitchen uses are wide. Stuffed jalapeños are hollowed out and filled with seafood, meat, poultry, or cheese. Pickled slices top nachos, the Tex-Mex dish of tortilla chips under melted cheese. Poppers are stuffed with cheese, usually cheddar or cream cheese, then breaded or wrapped in bacon and cooked. Armadillo eggs add a coat of seasoned sausage meat and a bacon wrap before grilling.

  Texas toothpicks are jalapeños and onions shaved into straws, lightly breaded, and deep-fried. Chiles toreados are sauteed in oil until the skin blisters, sometimes under melted cheese. Jalapeño jelly is a pepper jelly, and the peppers are also muddled into mixed drinks. Slices appear in Vietnamese pho and bánh mì, and on Western sandwiches and pizzas. In Mexico, cooks use them in salsa, pico de gallo, and grilled form.

  The pepper has also traveled far from the kitchen. Jalapeños were included as food on the Space Shuttle as early as 1982. In 1995 the Texas Legislature designated the jalapeño the official State Pepper of Texas, although it is a Mexican chili.

  Eating contests followed. Guinness World Records recognizes Alfredo Hernandes for 16 jalapeños in one minute, set on the 17th of September 2006 at the La Costeña Feel the Heat Challenge in Chicago, Illinois. Patrick Bertoletti holds the Major League Eating records. He ate 275 pickled jalapeños in 8 minutes on the 1st of May 2011, and 191 in 6.5 minutes on the 16th of September 2007 in the Short-Form category.

  The pepper has darker associations too. Joaquín Guzmán, known as El Chapo and the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, ran a cannery in Guadalajara producing Comadre Jalapeños, which he used to ship cocaine to the United States.

  The 1986 FIFA World Cup had a jalapeño for its official mascot, a pepper named Pique. It wore a moustache, a Colimote sombrero, and the colors of the Mexican football team. The name comes from picante, the Spanish word for spicy, and puns on PK, the abbreviation for a penalty kick. Pique is also a common Spanish name.

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