Hot Green Pepper

Hot Green Pepper is the everyday chili of the Egyptian table — slim, glossy and a vivid fresh green, picked young before it ripens so it keeps that bright, sharp heat and crisp, juicy bite. Chilies harvested green deliver the cleanest fiery flavour, perfect for chopped salads, dakka and salsas, stir-fries, and tangy pickles, while every fruit you pick while still green keeps the plant flowering and producing more. It is a generous, fuss-free variety that rewards a warm, sunny spot with a long, steady supply of fresh heat.

Planting

Hot peppers need a long warm season, so start seeds indoors 8 to 10 weeks before your last frost date — some hot types want up to 12 weeks of a head start. Sow about 0.6 cm deep in a sterile, soilless germination mix. Seeds usually sprout in around 10 days; an ideal soil temperature of 21°C gets things going, and a heat mat held at 27 to 32°C speeds and improves emergence. Once seedlings are up, keep them at 16 to 18°C in bright light. When the first true leaves appear, thin or prick out the seedlings so they stand 5 to 8 cm apart, or pot each one on once it reaches about 2 to 3 cm tall. Move plants outdoors only after nighttime lows stay above 10°C and the soil has warmed to at least 18°C. Space transplants 30 to 60 cm apart in the row, with rows about 75 to 90 cm apart; in the open ground 38 to 45 cm between plants works well, dropping to 30 cm for dwarf types, or one plant per 22 cm pot in containers. Give them the warmest, sunniest spot you have — full sun of at least 6 hours a day, with 8 to 10 hours preferred.

Fertilizing

Before planting, work a balanced fertilizer such as 10-10-10 or 13-13-13 into the soil at roughly 1 kg per 9 m², adjusting phosphorus and potassium according to a soil test, and keep the soil pH between 6.0 and 6.5. Once the first fruits set, side-dress with nitrogen to support continued growth and fruiting — but go easy, because too much nitrogen produces bushy, leafy plants that are slow to bear. For chilies grown in containers or under glass, start feeding weekly with a high-potassium liquid fertiliser, such as a tomato feed, as soon as flowering begins to push the plant toward fruit rather than foliage.

Care

Keep soil moisture even and steady. If the plants do not get about 2.5 cm of rain a week, soak the soil thoroughly at least once a week; drip irrigation or soaker hoses are far better than overhead watering, as they keep moisture uniform and reduce disease. Watch for common pests including cutworms, aphids, tomato hornworms and stink bugs, plus field pests like corn borer, earworm and armyworm, and keep an eye out for bacterial leaf spot, bacterial wilt and viruses, along with physiological problems such as blossom-end rot and sunscald. Peppers are usually ready 70 to 85 days after transplanting. Pick the first fruits promptly once they reach full size to encourage further fruit set — harvest them green for the boldest flavour and the biggest overall yield, since leaving chilies on the plant to ripen to full colour builds a hotter taste but suppresses new flowers and can cut the total harvest by 25% or more. In Egypt, hot pepper is a warm-season, frost-sensitive crop. The main crop is a spring one: start seeds under protection from late December to February, then transplant after the cold spells pass — late February to March in the Nile Delta and Lower Egypt for harvest from May into summer, and a few weeks earlier, from mid-February, in the warmer soils of Upper Egypt. Because Egyptian summers regularly top 30°C, which suppresses flowering and causes flower and fruit drop, aim to have plants flowering and setting fruit before the peak heat, with the heaviest harvest in late spring to early summer. A second autumn crop is possible too: sow in July to August under shade and transplant in late August to September for a cooler-weather harvest into November and December, as Egypt's mild winters rarely bring killing frost. Just protect young transplants from any January cold snaps, especially in the Delta.