Anaheim peppers: the long, mild green chile for roasting and rajas

The Anaheim is the long, mild green chile that Southern California cooks roast, peel and stuff, slice into rajas or chop into salsa verde. It takes its name from Orange County and its genetics from New Mexico. King Quality Produce carries Anaheims from June through February, packed in 20 lb boxes, Standard grade. Here is what it is, how it relates to the New Mexico chile, what to look for on the dock, how to store it, and what the nutrition entry says.

What an Anaheim is

Botanically, the Anaheim is a New Mexican pod type. New Mexico State University's cultivar history is blunt: the New Mexican pod type is "often mistakenly called 'Anaheim'"; the seed originated in New Mexico and was taken to Anaheim, California, where the pepper developed its own site-specific traits over time³. The lineage runs back to Fabián García, NMSU's first horticulturist, who began working on improved chiles in the 1880s and released New Mexico No. 9 in 1913, the first New Mexican variety with a dependable pod size and heat level^{3, 4}. NMSU's Chile Pepper Institute states that every New Mexican-type chile grown today, the Anaheim included, owes its genetic base to that cultivar⁴.

García wanted a chile that was larger, smoother, fleshier and more tapering, with a shoulderless pod for canning³, and that is a fair description of an Anaheim. In NMSU's descriptions the New Mexican pod type runs 6 to 8 inches long and about 2 inches wide, long-elliptical to oblong and bluntly pointed, with thick flesh³. The California selection kept one trait of its own: NMSU describes Sandia, bred from New Mexico No. 9 crossed with a California Anaheim type, as lacking the Anaheim's severe pod folds³. Those folds are the Anaheim's signature.

KQP sells Anaheims in a single Standard pack, 20 lb to the box, picked mature green, from June through February, following our growers through Mexico, the American Southwest and California.

How hot an Anaheim is

Mild, by chile standards. University of Arizona Cooperative Extension puts New Mexico-type chiles, including NuMex Big Jim, Sandia and New Mexico 6-4, at 500 to 2,500 Scoville Heat Units, against 0 for a bell pepper, 2,500 to 5,000 for a jalapeño, 10,000 to 23,000 for a serrano and 200,000 to 300,000 for a habanero⁵. NMSU's own tables put the original New Mexico No. 9 at about 1,000 to 1,500 SHU and NuMex Big Jim, released in 1975, at 6,500³, so the type spans a wider band than the word mild suggests.

Heat also varies with the field. NMSU says heat level is partly genetic and partly environmental: a mild cultivar under heat or water stress comes in hotter, a hot one under optimal conditions milder⁶. The lab measures capsaicinoids directly by liquid chromatography; the original Scoville test was a tasting panel, one dilution step per SHU⁶. For a kitchen, the practical test is the old one: taste a sliver before you commit the batch, because the same variety can eat noticeably hotter from one lot to the next.

Buying and receiving

UC Davis judges mature-green chiles on fruit size, firmness and color, and its quality indices are uniform shape, size and color typical of the variety, firmness, and freedom from cracks, decay and sunburn². For Anaheims, that means a deep, even green with firm, taut skin; a soft or wrinkled pod has lost water, and firmness tracks water loss directly². Red blush is not a defect, it is ripening, and UC Davis treats 50 percent coloration as the threshold for a colored chile²; if you want green pods for rellenos, say so. Check the stem end for gray mold (Botrytis and Alternaria are the common decay organisms) and the blossom end for blossom-end rot, a dark sunken lesion from a temporary calcium shortage under field heat stress². Corking, the corky striations on the skin, is considered unattractive in U.S. markets². Crushing, stem punctures and scrapes raise both weight loss and decay².

Pod count in a 20 lb box varies with pod size, so a kitchen portioning rellenos should tell us whether it wants longer pods or is fine with a mixed run.

• Deep, even green; firm and taut
• Clean stem end, no gray mold
• No dark sunken blossom-end lesions
• No crushed or punctured pods in the top layer

Storage and shelf life

Chiles keep. UC Davis puts the best storage temperature at 45°F, with relative humidity above 95 percent, for a shelf life of 3 to 5 weeks². At 41°F they hold at least two weeks without visible chilling injury and lose less water, but after two to three weeks the seeds discolor, the main sign of chilling, and mature-green chiles like Anaheims are more sensitive than colored ones². Above 45°F pods lose more water, shift color toward red and decay faster². Respiration is modest, 5 to 10 ml of CO2 per kilogram per hour at 50°F against 20 to 30 at 68°F², which is part of why it outlasts the beans and squash around it.

Controlled or modified atmospheres offer only slight benefit, and CO2 above 5 percent damages mature-green chiles with pitting, discoloration and softening², so do not seal boxes in plastic. Ethylene sensitivity varies by variety, with poblanos responding and jalapeños not²; UC Davis does not single out the Anaheim, so store it away from ripening fruit. Pungency holds in storage: chiles kept across a range of temperatures retain their capsaicin as long as they are still marketable².

Nutrition

USDA FoodData Central's reference entry for raw green hot chiles, listed as "Peppers, hot chili, green, raw," puts 100 g at 40 calories, 87.7 g water, 9.46 g carbohydrate, 5.1 g sugars, 1.5 g fiber, 2.0 g protein and 0.2 g fat¹. The vitamin numbers: 242 mg vitamin C, 0.278 mg vitamin B6, 59 µg vitamin A as RAE from 671 µg beta-carotene, 725 µg lutein and zeaxanthin, 14.3 µg vitamin K, 23 µg folate, 340 mg potassium, 1.2 mg iron and 7 mg sodium¹.

That vitamin C figure is more than two and a half times the adult RDA of 90 mg for men and 75 mg for women⁷ in a 100 g portion. NIH describes vitamin C as required for collagen synthesis, an important antioxidant, a contributor to immune function, and an aid to absorbing the nonheme iron in plant foods⁷. Green chiles are also a source of potassium and vitamin B6 with almost no sodium¹. The figures are for raw pods; the entry does not cover roasted and peeled chiles.

In the kitchen

The Anaheim is a roasting chile. Blistered over a burner or under a salamander, steamed in a covered container and peeled, it is the start of chiles rellenos, rajas con crema, green chile sauce for enchiladas and the chopped green chile that Southwestern kitchens put on everything from eggs to cheeseburgers. Sliced raw it gives a mild crunch to salads and tortas; diced into salsa verde it adds green-chile flavor without a jalapeño's heat.

Mexican kitchens in Los Angeles, from Boyle Heights to the Valley, want it green for rellenos and chile verde; markets sell it by the pound next to the tomatillos and cilantro for home salsa; and the fall roasting trade outside grocery stores runs through cases of it. With a shelf life measured in weeks, it is a case you can bring in Monday and still be roasting Friday.

Ordering

Anaheims are on the list from June through February in 20 lb boxes. Call the office at (213) 627-7181 for this week's counts.