flower pepper pickles

These beautiful flower peppers came from my friend Sandy who is a great gardener. Aside from their marvelous shape and startlingly red color, these peppers are also blessed with delicious and very sweet flesh, but the seeds can be tricky as you may end up every now and then biting into an extremely spicy one. Mostly these turned out to be mild, with a few noticeable exceptions. They sort of remind me a bit of garlicky pimientos de padrón. Spicy heat is not an issue at home because we adore it. However if you are concerned, just make sure you remove the seeds before eating these pepper treats. I didn’t bother. Plus they wouldn’t be quite as cute all sliced up.

fresh flower peppers from Sandy's garden

I tried to make these similar to the flower pepper pickles that I sampled the other week at the Whole Foods olive bar nearby our house. The recipe also reminds me a lot of pickled Serrano and jalapeño peppers.

flower pepper pickles cooling

flower pepper pickles

1lb fresh flower peppers, rinsed
½ cup olive oil
5 gloves garlic, smashed
10 black peppercorns
2 bay leaves
1½ cups white Italian wine vinegar (6% acidity)
1½ cups water
1 tbsp sugar
4 tbsp kosher salt

Just bring all the ingredients to a boil except for the flower peppers and olive oil. Meanwhile using a tooth pick, punch a couple of holes in each pepper to prevent them from bursting. Add them to the boiling vinegar solution, cover and simmer at low temperature for about 5 minutes. Transfer peppers to a jar. Top with olive oil. Let it rest at room temperature for about 8 hours then refrigerate. Eat them within a week or so.

You can have them as a side for sandwiches or wraps, with rice and beans, or as a snack to go with beer. They’re very tasty.