Desert Ironwood Chiltepin Grinders are an essential tool for any authentic Mexican kitchen, and they make great gifts for any occasion. Commonly added to soups and salsas the chiltepin pepper is very popular throughout Mexico and the southern United States. We sell the grinder with one ounce of free locally grown chiltepines. Read more about the chiltepin pepper below.
Chiltepin description
Chiltepin is a perennial shrub that usually grows to a height of around 1 m (3 ft 3 in), but sometimes reaches 3 m (9 ft 10 in). In areas without hard frost in winter, plants can live 35–50 years.
The tiny chili peppers of C. a. var. glabriusculum are red to orange-red, usually slightly ellipsoidal, and about 0.8 cm (1⁄3 in) in diameter. Some strains of tepin peppers are much closer to perfectly round when fresh. A dried tepin pepper appears quite round even if it was slightly ellipsoidal when fresh. Tepin peppers are very hot, in Scoville Heat Units (SHU) measuring between 465,000–1,629,000, or 325,000–2,469,000 depending on the capsaicinoid ⇨ SHU conversion method.
The tepin can be hotter than the habanero or red savina, with the highest levels seen in green fruit 40-50 days after fruit set.
However, since this pepper is primarily harvested from wild stands in the Mexican desert, the heat level of the fruit can vary greatly from year to year, depending on the amount of natural rainfall that occurs during the time the fruits are forming. Fruit heat levels can be weak during drought years, and normal rainfall years produce the highest heat levels. The heat levels also varies between the green fresh fruits (which are pickled in vinegar), red-ripe fresh fruits, dried whole fruit, and dried fruit with the seeds removed, with heat levels arranged from hottest to mildest in that order. Around 50 tons are estimated to be harvested commercially annually in Mexico, primarily in Sonora.
In Mexico, the heat of the chiltepin is called arrebatado (“rapid” or “violent”), because, while the heat is intense, it is not very enduring. This stands in contrast to the domesticated ‘Pequin’ variety, which is the same size as the wild tepin, but is oval-shaped, and delivers a decidedly different experience.
The different drying methods used for the tepin and ‘Pequin’, can help tell these peppers apart. Tepins are always sun-dried, whereas the Pequins are commonly dried over wood smoke, and the smell of the smoke in the Pequins can help separate the two varieties. Pequins are not as hot as chiltepins (only about 30,000–50,000 Scoville units), but they have a much slower and longer-lasting effect.
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