Dude, Where's My Peppers

Ding! Ding! School is session folks.

Okay, it has been about four months since we planted the seeds for our Poblano plants. In that time we have watched the plant grow, flower, and produced fruit. All seemed right. The rounded, berry-like fruit, changing from bright green to yellow, to orange. Unfortunately though, for the past few weeks now, we've watched as the peppers growth has stalled, remaining olive in size and orange. Up again against the wall of my understanding, I checked the back of the seed packet for the estimated time to harvest, 80 days. Well we blown right past period!

What is going on with these peppers? Have I been watering them to much? Is it a lack of nutrients in the soil? These questions have been lodged in the back of my brain for weeks now. Thinking that the solution might be linked to the need to pinch off the orange peppers, triggering the plant to develop larger, traditional looking Poblano peppers, I took to the garden this morning.

Kneeling down next to the plant, I picked off the first pepper. Pinching it between my fingers, I watched as the skin broken exposing the juice and seeds. Knowing that my next action my be a regret, I put the pepper to my tongue and waited for the heat from capsaicin to spread throughout my mouth. But, I hadn't expected it to taste sweet. Tempting fate, I popped the whole pepper in my mouth and bit down..still sweet, very much like a tomato! Trying a few more, I conclude that the joke was on us. Apparently, the folks at Ferris Morse accidently put orange pear tomatoes seeds in the wrong packet.

We laughed at ourselves, and agreed to try different seeds next year.