Around Christmas time, I took much evil delight in distributing mail order Pimientos de Padrón at various holiday season parties.
These peppers are lovely little delights that are randomly ‘hot or not’. The story goes that nine in ten are deliciously sweet, and one in ten is seriously hot. I found that the ratio was much closer to about one in four being hot enough to make me dizzy.
Nonetheless, the pimientos were such a hit that I ordered a second batch in mid-January. Richard at Midyim Eco Resort, who grows the pimientos, very kindly sent me a complimentary bag of a different pepper that he was trialling, called the ‘Gernika’.
The Gernikas are about twice the size of the little Padróns. I cooked them in the same way – by frying them in a little pan and then sprinkling them with olive oil and sea salt. The prognosis? They were equally as subtly sweet as the mild Padróns, with none of the heat. This made them safer for chilli-phobes, but somehow less exciting.
Is this another life lesson that can be learned from food? Danger = exciting…
I love Richard’s Padrons! I agree that the hot to sweet ratio was high a month or two back and we certainly didn’t get through our box as quickly as normal! Will eagerly await the next season so I can try some of these new babies out