Back in 2019, I purchased a packet of “Alma Paprika” seeds. I grew about half a dozen plants. While I got a decent harvest, they’d been attacked by corn earworm. Still, I cut off the yucky bits, dried it and popped it in the cupboard, where I mostly didn’t use it.

But more recently, paprika has been slipping into my cooking. I really appreciated using a very tasty product that I’d grown myself all those years ago. As I was heading towards the end of my saved harvest, I realised I’d need to grow more.

So I dug around my seed collection and found the seeds I’d saved from those original plants. Last spring, I sowed a big pile of them. Two plants germinated.

I cared for them, and ultimately harvested some paprika fruit, which I’ve turned into paprika powder.

What is paprika?

Paprika is a particular variety of capsicum (actually a few of them). Alma paprika in particular grows white initially, then reddens as it approaches time to harvest.

They are smaller and rounder than your regular bell pepper, and have a stronger flavour. They have very thick walls.

Turning the capsicum fruit into paprika powder is a matter of drying it, followed by turning it into a powder.

Growing paprika

My seedlings were sown in September. They went into the garden in late October.

By early January, I was seeing flowers and the first few fruit.

And in early March, they had reddened up and I was starting to harvest those early fruit. I also noticed a second flush of fruit coming through.

Many people consider capsicum to be an annual plant because it doesn’t deal with the cold of winter too well. But the truth is it can be treated as a perennial if you can protect it from frost and cooler weather.

So my plan is to keep these plants going as long as I can. With a bit of luck they’ll continue to produce for at least a couple more months, and hopefully into next year.

Processing paprika

The first harvest gave me 4 fruit.

I de-seeded them (keeping the seed aside for growing next year) and trimmed them up. When all was said and done I had 150g of paprika for drying.

That went into my trusty K-Mart dehydrator. It took about 22 hours of drying at 55ºC before they were crispy, snapping when I tested them.

After all that, I was left with about 20g of dried matter, which I then put into my trusty K-Mart coffee grinder to grind down into paprika powder.

Results

That 20g of dried paprika represents months of care. Hours of work.

Ultimately, it’s worth about $3 of savings compared to just buying a box of paprika.

It might not be quite as red as I’d like it to be, but it’s really, really tasty and smells incredible. I never really understood the real point of paprika until I grew it.

My Gran once told me the secret to her cauliflower cheese was she sprinkled the top with paprika to make it look browned. For most of my life, I thought it was about colour, rather than flavour.

Homegrown paprika is pungent and rich in a way I’ve not experienced from a box. Even years after I grew it!

What I’d really like to do with it is create a spice mix. Paprika, garlic, perhaps some dried herbs or crushed seeds. There’s a wide range of things I grow, and experimenting with my own home-grown produce to create something special sounds fun.

But I’m definitely going to need more paprika.

The plan from here

My plants are still producing a second flush. There’s a good chance I’ll double my harvest before winter sets in.

I have saved the seed from this grow, and plan to sow it again next spring. Hopefully the saved seed will have a better germination rate than the older seed I began with.

Now that I’ve topped up my supplies, I’d also like to have a play with smoking it. This will give me smoked paprika, and bring a deeper flavour to my cooking.

Alongside paprika, I’ll keep growing, harvesting and drying my other herbs and spices.

The spice mix is probably still a few seasons off, but this is a start.