Jalapenos and Cayennes are great peppers to start with. I would suggest some Hot Hungarian Wax as well. Easy to grow, good producers and a good mild to medium heat.
If you buy and start from seed, stay away from the Ebay and Amazon.com suppliers. It is a crap shoot buying from them. Many are good but many are selling any old seed and labeling it as some of the more popular varieties. you don't realize it until many months later when your Ghost pepper seeds make Bell peppers. For you first year, I would just go with what I can find at the local garden center seed racks. If you are looking to start with starter plants, you should be able to get some good deals at those same garden centers as they try to clear out the left over plants for this growing season. If they haven't closed up shop completely already.

Good luck and welcome to the forum. You won't find a better source for Pepper growing information anywhere on the web. You have hundreds of growers right here.

Thank you, I will get started at the garden centers right away!
More to come...

What are you looking to grow? I have some seeds of various types from this year, all OP (Open Pollinated). I have Sweet Cayenne, Cayenne Blend (various colors when grown) and some jalapeno seeds. Also some super hots.

Bill

This post was edited by Bill_Missy on Sun, Aug 4, 13 at 17:01

You may want to consider including cherry types, hot or non. They are very fleshy, and have usually been some of my stronger plants. Good for pickling and putting in sandwiches, or stuffing with cream cheese..

otherwise, if you are interested in easily snackable peppers, you also have Padron and Shishitos to chose from.. quickly fried up, they make a good beer drinking snack

hope this helps. good luck! -E

Cayenne really isn't a very good eating pepper: too little flesh, too thick skin, too many seeds. But they are tough little plants and so good for a first time grower. Jalapenos are good eats and also pretty easy to grow. Bell peppers are finicky, low yield, and generally disappointing - stick to buying them in stores.

For fun, add in something odd with name recognition, like tabasco. Habanero is fun and good eats. All can be had as starter plants - some, particularly in cooler parts of the country, should still be on shelves.

And remember that peppers are perennials. They won't take cold weather but you can bring them in to get a running start on next year. Good luck.

I would like to grow habaneros also, nice reminder!
I would like to dry and grind the cayenne into my own spice.
Also, thank you for the suggestion on bell peppers, I will steer clear!
Besides jalapenos, I also love banana peppers. Anyone have experience with those?

Bill_Missy I would be very interested in purchasing seeds from you! Jalapenos and cayennes deinitely as well as if you have bananas and habaneros.

I grow hot and sweet banana peppers most years. They're as easy as most peppers. My favorite to look at are tabascos which grow large and are prolific, but they don't ripen until later in the season so need to be started early. Agree with chilemilio above about padron. It's been my favorite the last two years.

DMF, I used to agree whole-heartedly on the belles, I planted them year after year with essentially no yield at all, then last year I tried them again and used MG Shake and Feed fertilizer for tomatoes, I was buried in belles, last year and this year. Plus, at least when you grow your own you can have any color of the rainbow, vs green, red, or yellow in the store. ;-)

Tabasco is a great addition, as is Beaver Dam, NuMex Big Jim, Ancho Large Mexican.

Happy growing.
Pam

Banana peppers (and jalapenos) are easy to grow & easy to find. I'd definitely recommend them to new growers (not too hot, either).

You'll probably have a hard time finding seedlings at the garden centers this time of year. Therefore, you'll probably have to start them from seed.

One option that some folks have had good luck with is using the seeds from the peppers you buy at the store (or farmer's market). I'm told that the ripe (non-green) peppers often have viable seeds.

Ohheygwen,

I don't sell seeds. Email me and I will send you some seeds. I have sweet Cayenne and a Cayenne Blend (Multi-color and hotter than normal), I have Orange/pumpkin Habanero's and two varieties of Jalapeno's. A lot more, but they are mostly super-hots. I also have Tabasco and a Korean hot pepper. Keep in mind these are all Open Pollinated (OP) from this years pods. I have no Banana peppers, but I do have Pepperoncini's.

Bill

This post was edited by Bill_Missy on Tue, Aug 6, 13 at 20:10