recipes

Our Chile Head Sampler is on sale now!

Whether your taste runs toward a fiery jam to warm up your toast on chilly mornings or a crusty cornbread with colorful seasonal pods, the Chile Head Sampler can be your kitchen companion.

This user-friendly guide to cooking with chiles features nearly 40 original recipes by Master Gardeners of Santa Clara County in categories such as main dishes, sauces, dips and preserves. The book, first published in 2002 and currently in its fourth printing, also includes tips on how to extend the season by drying, smoking, marinating, barbecuing and freezing chiles.

The Sampler includes a section on how to grow chiles. Packaged in holiday colors of red, green and ivory, the chile book will spice up holiday gift baskets and the creations cooks will conjure up will make guests merry and puffed up with mirth and glee.

In easy-to-follow style, the Master Gardener chile book team carries out the volunteer organization's mission of providing horticultural information and educating the public within its pages. As in previous years, the Master Gardeners grew nearly 100 varieties of rare chiles in their demonstration trials. Plants are sold, along with plenty of free advice, at our annual Spring Garden Market.