Early Jalapeño

Green fruit tastes like a classic jalapeño—bright, slightly grassy, and crisp—while fully red pods are sweeter with the same medium heat concentrated in the placenta and seeds.

Early Jalapeño is a compact Capsicum annuum open-pollinated cultivar released by Petoseed Co. in 1977 and also recorded as Jalapeño M-10. Plants typically stand 60–90 cm and set blunt, sausage-shaped fruit about 6–9 cm long and 2.5 cm wide, with thick walls that stuff, pickle, and slice cleanly. Pods are harvested dark green at 60–65 days from transplant and ripen to dark red with characteristic brown corking, or checking, by about 80–85 days. The variety is widely adapted, container-friendly, and especially useful in short seasons. Flavor is grassy and bright when green, sweeter and a touch hotter when red.

Jalapeños take their name from Xalapa (Jalapa), the capital of Veracruz, Mexico, where the type was historically processed. Early Jalapeño is a U.S. open-pollinated selection of that type, catalogued by Petoseed in 1977 as a widely adapted, medium-hot jalapeño that colors from green to red. Its earliness and compact habit later made it a standard parent in university breeding, including Paul Bosland’s NuMex jalapeño program at New Mexico State University.

How hot is Early Jalapeño?

Capsi’s sourced range is 30,388–48,313 SHU (Lab-verified). Capsi uses a sourced range and a trust tier, not a single marketing number. How we verify heat: https://web.thecapsi.app/learn/heat-and-capsaicin/how-we-measure-heat

What does Early Jalapeño taste like?

Green fruit tastes like a classic jalapeño—bright, slightly grassy, and crisp—while fully red pods are sweeter with the same medium heat concentrated in the placenta and seeds.

How do I grow Early Jalapeño?

Early Jalapeño: about 65 days to maturity, subtropical climate, full sun, hardiness zones 9-11.

What can I substitute for Early Jalapeño?

Capsi does not have that recorded yet.