I have also decided to join the project and write about My Texas Alphabet twice a week.
I did not know anything about jalapeños when I came to Texas.
One day, a few weeks after my arrival, I thought I would cook a Texas casserole as I had found a recipe for it in one of my cookbooks. We had all the necessary ingredients at home, including jalapeños. I did not know what they were, though. They looked like a kind of rather strange, green bell peppers to me. Anyway, I followed the recipe - cut half of a small jalapeño into tiny pieces and made the dish. Everything seemed fine and looked really good. When we started eating our dinner, the casserole turned out to be so very hot (meaning spicy of course) that I could hardly swallow it. It was my first experience with the taste of the jalapeño. I had never tried it before. We did eat our dinner on that day, but we needed much more tea than we usually do.
That was how I learned that jalapeños are green chili peppers. I have used them doing the cooking many times since that day. Needless to say, now I am more careful meaning the amount of the green hot thing which I use to improve the taste of our meals. On the other hand, I have also learned that jalapeños, although they look mostly the same, are not equally hot. Some are actually quite mild considering their heat. That first time when I used the jalapeño, I was lucky to have one on the high side of the heat range. All in all, I am not very keen on this chili pepper (even though it contains vitamin A and C). If I happen to have too many of jalapeño pieces on my tostadas, I just remove the green part on my plate.
An interesting fact is that the jalapeño is the state pepper of Texas (since 1995).
Other 'J' entries by Polish Ladies Abroad:
Gabi: J for Jonas
Karolina: J... J'adore!
Dee Dorota: J jak Jeszcze Żyję!
Justyna: J jak Jury Summons
Anna Maria: J jak Ja
Learned something new today! Didn't know Jalapenos are chili peppers...and that they can be very spicy :)
ReplyDeleteYes, they can be very hot indeed :) Good day!
DeleteI'm like you, I hate jalapenos, never eat anything with them if I can help it, and pick them out of the food. When I was in college here in Texas, it was a big thing to have jalapeno-eating contests. Yuk!
ReplyDeleteI got used to them and I also add them (but not too much) to the food I make at home.
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