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Are Pepper Blossoms edible ?

16 years ago

I am trying to grow a pepper plant as pereniel.It was transplanted in the pot at the end of last summer.It is growing nicely and is blossoming at this time.I want to use these blossoms as one of the ingredient in my salad bowl.Please let me know if you have used pepper blossoms in salad or any other info. about herbal benefits of pepper blossoms.

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Comments (11)

Daisyduckworth
16 years ago
Are you referring to the plant which produces peppercorns (Piper nigrum), or to a member of the Capsicum family (chillies, bell peppers etc)?

Either way, you want to leave the flowers so you can get the fruit which follows. Don't you??
chaman
Original Author
16 years ago
This plant belongs to Capsicum family.In fact I harvested plenty of peppers from the same plant during last summer.As I have mentioned earlier that this plant was transplanted from back yard garden at the end of summer of 2007 before the on set of freezing temperature to raise as pereniel plant.Plant is in sun room and about 9 months old producing bunch of flowers.I intend to take the plant out door by end of May 2008 by that time plant will be one year old.Since there are plenty of flowers and I am not sure the flowers will produce any fruits at this time I thought to use the flowers in salad.Few of the flowers have already droped.
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I would follow growers advise quite closely for the chemical reason alone. If the label says not edible, don't eat it. However I don't think anyone would be idiotic enough to produce/breed a poisonous chilli, that would be criminal. Someone, somewhere will eventually eat it, if not direct from the store bought plant, fruit from it's seedlings etc. I bought a grafted lemon tree in full fruit and it was labelled as inedible for "ornamental purposes only". This irritated me as it grew extremely well when planted and produced fruit second to none. It produced flowers and fruit all year and good healthy foliage. For different reasons I then spent months tracking down it's wholesaler and then grower in Sicily, the wholesaler had already stopped stocking citrus. When I got to the bottom of it I was told it was a speciality lemon, specialite regionale (the Italian version) used for forcing and extremely edible, a highly prized variety grown on virus resistant stock. The middle men the wholesaler and exporter in a different country entirely said they had been treating the trees with systemic fungicides and pesticides when in full fruit at time of sale and thats why they were labelled as such. Of course they might not have been so enticing for the consumer had the label said "danger this plant has been treated with lethal toxic chemicals". And of course after a couple of years I had already tasted the fruit and decided they were stunningly delicious, both good for juice and zesting. I was more interested in the variety and graft stock used as it did so well. But had I been tempted to try the fruit straight away I might have become seriously sick.....so just shows. It can take awhile for systemic chemicals to be neutralised and in a short lived plant like a chilly pepper......not worth it. White fly apparently is a big problem in production of chilly pepper plants and is often difficult to eradicate without systemics, which are often used anyway to stop even a small possibility of an accidental infestation that could ruin an entire crop of plants. I live for the day ornamental pot plants and garden plants are labelled "organically produced", but when it says not for consumption believe it.
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ksrogers
16 years ago
I tried to do this as well, and found the pepper plants didn't do well the second year outside. Besides that, once it was brought indoors, it also brought in lots of fungus gnats and these infested everything else inside. I don't think the blossoms will be very good. Keep in mind that even a pepper plant is still in the poisonous nightshade family as are tomatoes. You can try to use a Q tip to pollinate some. Also a plant spray called 'blossom set spray' can be used to help strengthen the stems of both tomatoes and peppers so the flowers don't drop prematurely.
Daisyduckworth
16 years ago
Do not eat the flowers.
chaman
Original Author
16 years ago
Thanks daisyduckworth for your good advice all the time.
ksrogers
16 years ago
Chaman, guess you didn't notice my mention of the poisonous nightshade family of plants.... For many centuries people used to think tomatoes were also poisonous. Their leaves are, and thats what makes that big fat tomato hornworm so distastful to birds who like eating bugs.
chaman
Original Author
16 years ago
ksrogers, thanks for your info. about nightshade family of plants and the way to pollinate flowers by using Q-tips.I tried to pollinate this afternoon using q-tips.Plant is in really good shape after it was brought inside the sun room.I hope it will work.My main objective is to find if it is pereniel.
Daisyduckworth
16 years ago
Members of the capsicum family are mostly annuals, but if provided with excellent conditions they can live for many years. Certainly in hot climates they live much longer. It depends somewhat on the species. Don't be surprised if yours keels over at any time, out of the blue, but while it's thriving, enjoy it!
santi_rodriguez
16 years ago
Chaman I had a pepper plant that was about 7 years when it died, and I'm sorry to say that it was my mistake. It was potted in the same pot all its life, so I thought I'd re-pot it and in the process I damaged the rootball, killing it. I am certain that if not it would have continued to live on. I never brought it into the house in winter, and it wistood temperatures of about 25 degrees. It always produced exellent peppers during the summer.

Good Luck

Santi
chaman
Original Author
16 years ago
ksrogers, I tried to pollinate using Q-tips and it worked. If the flowers are close by I rub them face to face to transfer the pollens.Now there are half a dozen peppers budding out.I hope they will grow till maturity.Still I am uncertain about strength of heat.
daisyduckworth, yes, plant is thriving.
ksrogers
16 years ago
Peppers love lots of sun, but after they get higher in temps above about 85 degrees, they will slow down producing and growing very much. Blossom set spray (gibberalic acid) is used to help strengthen the flower stems which grow to hold the peppers.

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