THE SAUCY TOMATO

Courtesy of http://www.smoking-meat.com

Courtesy of http://www.vahrehvah.com/

Courtesy of http://www.showmethecurry.com

If you've ever bought a jar of mild or hot pepper rings, you've already tried pickled banana peppers. Mt Olive makes my favorite brand of pickled banana pepper rings so I decided to replicate their recipe as close as possible and I think I've come close.

The first decision to make is whether you want mild or hot pepper rings. The rings will be mild if you use sweet banana peppers and hot if you use a hotter pepper such as New Mexico chilies or Sahauros. If all you have are sweet banana peppers you can make them spicier by including a whole jalapeño in the jar when you pickle them.

Refrigerator pickles are one of the tastiest and easiest ways to use an abundance of cucumbers. There is no canning involved and the process takes all of about 15 minutes.

First, wash the cucumbers. My favorites are the hothouse or English variety of cucumbers that have very few seeds.

The chili is one of the most versatile weapons in a cook's kitchen. The chili can be introduced into almost any dish to add heat and zing. In this article we will investigate some of the chilies many types, uses and its various methods of preservation.

First lets discuss the scolville heat scale, a scolville unit measures the heat content of a pepper. The higher the scolville unit the hotter the chili. Below is a list of the most common varies of peppers and there scolville measure.

There are many reasons it is beneficial to take the time to dry your fresh herbs when you have an abundance during the summer. Drying your homegrown herbs enables you to enjoy your garden harvest year round. You will be surprised at the difference between store bought dried herbs and those you dry yourself. Home dried herbs generally smell more pungent and appear greener than those at the store.

Have you ever read an article about smoking food? The article investigates every detail of the brining, marinating, injecting and dry rub process, however when it is time to smoke the food it simply says "smoke at 220 for 5 hours". How do you keep the smokers temperature at 220? How often do you refuel the smoker and with what? How do you adjust the flu to increase or decrease the heat or smoke?