Rocoto peppers look a little like the bell peppers you find in the supermarket, however, rocoto peppers are much spicier. It is a Capsicum pubescens species, and has black seeds and purple flowers.
Rocoto peppers are especially juicy, and are great when stuffed and used in many different dishes. They’ve got a good crunch and thickness, and go well on pizzas or with egg-based dishes.
What Do Rocoto Peppers Look Like?
Rocoto peppers are round and thick, and sort of resemble a bell pepper or a semi-ripe tomato.
What Do Rocoto Peppers Taste Like?
Rocoto peppers taste slightly like traditional supermarket bell peppers with added juiciness from a fresh tomato and a similar heat blast that you would get from a habanero pepper. The flesh of the rocoto pepper is thick and crunchy, yet moist and juicy at the same time.
How Hot Are Rocoto Peppers?
Rocoto peppers range from between 30,00 and 100,000 Scoville units (SHU), which is pretty much equal to habanero peppers in heat.
How Do You Use Rocoto Peppers?
Rocoto peppers work well with main meals. They can also be stuffed and made into sauces. These peppers compliment most dishes and add a great kick to the meal. Rocoto peppers don’t dry out like other types of pepper, because it has a moist flesh.
Because of this, you need to take care not to steam the other food ingredients you cook with rocoto peppers if your dish is not supposed to be steamed. If you don’t want to steam your food, it’s better to bake or roast the rocoto peppers and make sauces and salsas with it.
You can chop them up and sauté them, or stuff them with meat and spices to make the pepper the main part of the dish. Rocoto peppers can also be enjoyed raw, however they will be pretty hot without cooking them with other ingredients so make sure to consider this before eating them.
Don’t forget to wash your hands and don’t touch your eyes when handling the rocoto pepper as heat burn from this fiery capsicum is no joke!
Where Can You Find Rocoto Peppers?
It’s quite difficult to find rocoto peppers in your usual store or supermarket. This is because the pepper does not dry out like other peppers so can’t be stored and kept as well.
You may find it in powder form, otherwise it’s best to look in speciality stores and farmers markets during the summer season, where stalls sometimes specialize in many different pepper varieties.
How Do You Store Rocoto Peppers?
Make sure to store rocoto peppers in the fridge to prevent them from ripening at room temperature.
If you get rocoto peppers in the powdered or paste form, you can store it in jars in the cupboard for many years before opening. Once opened, you can store it for a few months in a cool and dry place.
Now that you know all about rocoto peppers and where to get them from, why not try adding them to your dishes to add a bit of heat to your meals?
