Sweet Maria Ripens

Around the start of the summer I was given a ‘Twilight’ variety chili pepper plant; “an unusual medium/hot variety producing a rainbow of fruits. Harvest July to September”.

The plant – now named Maria – was well-watered, dosed with organic tomato feed, and given as much sunshine as it could take. It produced was a mass of tiny white flowers which turned into a mass of miniature, hard, purple chilies. Over the last couple of weeks or so the fruits have started to grow and ripen. The very first chili harvested contained a maggot; the second two batches were better, four or so small, hot, chilies. They might have been picked a touch under-ripe. A number of fruits are beginning to really ripen now, including a few nice large ones (ding dong, carry on). Ripening starts with the dark purple blanching unpleasantly into a jaundice yellow; that ripen though oranges and reds, starting at the tip and heading to stem.

The plant itself is lovely, a good two-foot high and wide. It dominates the window and is easily seen from the ground, two floors down. Some of the leaves have wilted, there is some leaf burn, and several leaves have a few bites out of them. I removed one caterpillar and two aphids; and I have left several small spiders. The debut crops were used in soups (chicken and vegetable, ham and potato) and were spiced-up marvelously by them. Looks like a bumper crop of hot chilies over the next few weeks. Let’s see if Maria survives the winter – perhaps I should dump her away in a manger somewhere.

The photos demonstrate something more than the plant: that my camera is now working again. Beware, photophobes!

The decidedly surreal final photo is insisde my apartment hall, entering from the front door. That’s The Dude starting at you: through a mirror, on my door, behind kaleidoscopic lenses. Mirrors, doors, and lenses are all good perception references, so I’m sure he would approve.