Habanero peppers: fruit-forward heat, sized small and large

The habanero is the pepper that made hot sauce a category. Lantern-shaped, thin-walled and bright orange when ripe, it carries a fruity, apricot-like aroma underneath heat that runs up to fifty times a jalapeño's. King Quality Produce has orange habaneros in season from June through November, sized Small or Large and packed in 10 lb boxes. Here is what it is, how hot it is in numbers, how to buy and store it, and what the nutrition entry says.

What a habanero is

Habaneros are Capsicum chinense. Rutgers Cooperative Extension traces the species to the Amazon Basin, domesticated more than 6,000 years ago and carried by Native Americans into the Caribbean; the name habanero refers to the fruit type from the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico and Belize³. In the United States, New Mexico, California, Florida and Texas are among the top commercial producers³.

The fruit is short and blunt with pronounced corrugations and sometimes a pointed tip, and it ripens to red, orange, yellow, brown or white depending on the selection³. Orange is the commercial standard and the one KQP carries. The aroma is fruity, often described as apricot or citrus-like³; the heat arrives with flavor. It is a full-season crop that may need close to 200 days to produce ripe fruit³, one reason supply is seasonal. We sell it Small or Large, 10 lb to the box.

How hot, in numbers

Chile heat is measured in Scoville Heat Units. The original Scoville test had tasters dilute chile extract until they could no longer detect heat, each dilution step counting as one SHU; the modern method, high-performance liquid chromatography, measures the individual capsaicinoids directly and is what New Mexico State University calls the most accurate method⁶. More than 22 capsaicinoids are known, with capsaicin and dihydrocapsaicin usually in the highest concentrations⁶.

On that scale, NMSU's Chile Pepper Institute has measured the orange habanero at 250,000 SHU, the Red Savina habanero at 500,000 and the chocolate habanero at 700,000⁴. NMSU's cultivar circular cites the orange habanero at about 300,000 SHU on a dry-weight basis⁵; Rutgers gives a range of 150,000 to 350,000 SHU, up to 50 times a jalapeño³; and University of Arizona Cooperative Extension puts habaneros at 200,000 to 300,000 and calls them the hottest commercially available chiles in U.S. markets⁸. For comparison, jalapeños run 2,500 to 5,000 SHU and New Mexico-type green chiles 500 to 2,500⁸.

Heat is not fixed. NMSU notes that heat level is partly genetic and partly environmental: temperature and water stress push a cultivar hotter, and the same cultivar grown under optimal conditions comes in milder⁶. That is why two boxes from different fields can eat differently in the same week. NMSU has also bred the heat out. NuMex Suave Orange and NuMex Suave Red, released in 2004, are habanero-type peppers with habanero aroma at 335 and 774 SHU⁵. We do not stock them, but they make the point that much of a habanero is flavor rather than fire.

Buying and receiving

Use the UC Davis quality indices for chiles: uniform shape, size and color typical of the variety, firmness, and freedom from cracks, decay and sunburn; for colored chiles, at least 50 percent coloration indicates full color development². A ripe orange habanero should be glossy and taut. A dull, wrinkled pod has lost water, and UC Davis notes that firmness is directly related to water loss in storage². 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 calcium shortage under field heat and water stress². Crushing, stem punctures and scrapes lower visual quality and increase both weight loss and decay².

On sizing: Small pods are what sauce makers and salsa kitchens want, more pods per pound and no trimming before they blend or roast whole. Large pods go to kitchens that stuff them, slice them for garnish or want fewer pieces to seed. Whichever you buy, wear gloves. Pepper oils cause skin rashes and eye irritation, and Rutgers recommends latex or vinyl gloves whenever hot peppers are handled³.

• Glossy, taut skin with no wrinkling
• Even orange color; no green shoulders unless ordered that way
• Clean stem end, no gray mold
• No dark sunken spots at the blossom end

Storage and shelf life

Chile peppers store longer than most of what sits next to them. UC Davis puts the best temperature at 45°F, which gives a shelf life of 3 to 5 weeks, with relative humidity above 95 percent². At 41°F, chiles 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 chilling². Above 45°F the pods lose more water, change color and decay faster². Colored chiles such as a ripe habanero are less chilling-sensitive than mature-green chiles, and chiles are less sensitive than bell peppers².

Habaneros are one of the chiles that increase ethylene production as they ripen, and may exceed 1 µl per kilogram per hour at 68 to 77°F², so keep a ripening box away from green chiles and lettuce. The good news for buyers is that pungency holds: UC Davis reports that chiles stored across a range of temperatures keep their capsaicin levels as long as they remain marketable². A three-week-old habanero is as hot as a fresh one.

Nutrition

USDA FoodData Central's reference entry for ripe hot chiles, listed as "Peppers, hot chili, red, raw," puts 100 g at 40 calories, 88 g water, 8.81 g carbohydrate, 5.3 g sugars, 1.5 g fiber, 1.87 g protein and 0.44 g fat¹. The vitamins: 143.7 mg vitamin C, 0.506 mg vitamin B6, 48 µg vitamin A as RAE from 534 µg beta-carotene and 40 µg beta-cryptoxanthin, 709 µg lutein and zeaxanthin, 14 µg vitamin K, 322 mg potassium and 9 mg sodium¹.

Against the adult RDA for vitamin C of 90 mg for men and 75 mg for women⁷, 100 g of ripe chile delivers well over a day's worth, though nobody eats 100 g of habaneros. Every 10 g of pod still carries about 14 mg, in the range of a medium raw tomato's 17 mg⁷. Vitamin C is required for collagen synthesis, acts as an antioxidant, plays a role in immune function and improves absorption of the nonheme iron found in plant foods⁷. What the entry supports is that habanero is a concentrated source of vitamin C in a very small portion.

In the kitchen

Los Angeles runs on habanero. Yucatecan kitchens make the charred-habanero salsa and the pickled red onion that go with cochinita pibil; Caribbean and Belizean cooks build hot sauces on it with carrot and onion, the base Rutgers describes as the pepper's main use³; and sauce makers across the county buy it by the case. Its best use is where fruit and heat both matter: mango or pineapple salsa, aguachile and ceviche, marinades for chicken and pork, infused oils and vinegars, and any hot sauce where the aroma should survive the bottle.

A little goes far: one pod seasons a quart of salsa, and for flavor without the full fire, char the pepper whole, split it and steep it in the sauce rather than blending it in. Markets sell habaneros by the pound in small displays; kept cool and dry, they outlast everything else on the chile table.

Ordering

Orange habaneros are in from June through November, Small or Large, 10 lb boxes. Call the office at (213) 627-7181 for this week's counts and sizing.