Hey Ken! just picked up your message, Had a houseful for the holiday weekend, been busy, even done most of the cooking, we are pushing eighty, and I do try and take the strain where I can!!! Like other things, you are right about the common lanuage, tho' of course it it just not that, it is only fairly recently that we have started to regard peppers as an every day cooking ingredient; when we first got married ('52) they were just not around, 'twas the advent of easy travel that began to expose us to more exotic fare than " Roast Beef and Yorkshire Pud". Jamie Oliver! Are you able to see his stuff over there? We have almost non stop cookery programs on our screens, and this of course has presented many more options aimed at tickleing our taste buds. The next time I visit our local Mexian resturant I can toss out some pepper based terms as if I know what I am talking about! Be interesting to see what arrives on the table! Thank you for your reply,Regards, John Ken Hulme said:
Ok John. You've gotten the start of an American culinary vocabulary now that we've cleared up Garbanzos for you. You also know that Anchos are dried Poblano peppers, both of which have more flavor but almost no more heat than an ordinary bell pepper. And a Chipotle is a ripe and smoked (not grilled as someone said) Jalapeo pepper. Oh yes - and Wax beans are like green beans but more subtle flavor, and they are sometimes called string beans or butter beans.
Pepper have confusing names because they change name often, when dried - like Poblano/Ancho and jalapeo/chipotle. Poblanos/Anchos are very mild - often hardly warmer than a green or red bell pepper. Another mild dried pepper is the Chile Negro and Chile Mulatto. Soaking a dried pepper for 20 minutes in warm water brings them back to life. Chipotles are definately spicy. You quite often find them canned "en adobo sauce" which is a decidedly spicy tomato sauce.
Here's one you may or may not know - the salad green you call Rocket we call Arugula! Took me forever to figure out what Jamie Oliver was nattering on about!
The UK and the US - two countries divided by a common language!