They are raised like any sweet pepper and I am only familiar with the sweet variety. Pimento cheese spread is where I used the ones that I grew. I'm sure that the receipe sites have other ideas. I was the only member of my family that liked them, so I no longer grow them.

Hi,
I grew a variety of pimiento this year and I cannot remember but it was an open-pollinated variety. I started the seeds indoors in February. Took about 10 days for them to germinate. I transplanted them into the garden in May (it took some time to get the ground plowed and tilled becuase of rain, etc.) and they grew into 24 inch plants. They bore prolifically. The fruit were about the size and shape of an adult human heart. They started turning red in late July and they were very sweet and flavorful. We enjoyed them in fresh garden salad and on veggie trays. They were also good roasted in the oven.

I'm thinking about trying the lipstick.
http://www.johnnyseeds.com/catalog/search.aspx?scommand=search&search=Pimento

I grew pimento over the summer and I didn't get heavy yields. I had to leave them on the vine for so long to turn red that the plant hit max load and didn't put any more buds out. But I will try to grow again next year since I loved the taste of it. Roasting it totally knocked my socks off. It was very sweet. That lipstick variety sounds pretty good and I may look into growing that next summer myself.

Lipstick is an great tasting 3-4" sweet pepper with a decent red-ripening time of around 75-80 days.

Check out the (hot) pepper forum for a SASE offer on a pepper I've been breeding if you're interested, btw. It's only 2.5-3.5" though.

kbhale,

I grew pimento this year for the first time. I grew one called simply "Pimento Sweet" and one I started from seed called "Red Cheese". I love these peppers. The Pimento Sweet I grew were rather large around 2" wide and 2.5" long. The walls are super thick. The Red Cheese looks like a minature pumpkin (only red) they were about 2.5" wide and only 1.5-2 inches tall. The Red Cheese also have very thick walls. I do not dry them or pickle them I use them just like sweet bell peppers in cooking. I will try other pimento peppers in 2010 until I find one with a REALLY SWEET flavor that I like.

I did find that the Pimento Sweet plants were not very prolific. The Pimento Sweet put on about 7-8 peppers per plant and then stopped!! Not another flower or pepper until the first 7-8 were turning red. The Red Cheese were not prolific but they kept putting out flowers and peppers -- as a matter of fact the plant is still alive and green with flowers and baby peppers after a mild frost. (33 degrees at night for 2 hours)

Hope this helps.

DL