Tangerine Tiger

Crunchy and juicy with bright sweet-fruity baccatum flavor and a gentle citrus edge. Heat builds as a manageable medium burn rather than a sharp spike, and the pods lack the soapy note found in some ajis.

Tangerine Tiger is a Capsicum baccatum selection grown for looks and flavor more than raw heat. Plants are tall and productive, often over 120 cm, and need staking once they load up with fruit. Pods run about 4–10 cm, upright to pendant, with very thick flesh; they ripen from green to tangerine-orange and usually pick up red stripes, though the line is still unstable and also throws long, stubby, stripeless, and yellow phenotypes. Heat is generally quoted at 5,000–10,000 SHU. Flavor is sweet and fruity with a crunchy bite and little of the soapy note some baccatums show, so the peppers work fresh in salads and salsas as well as pickled, sauced, or dried.

Around 2019 Paula Thomas (Gapey's Grub) grew Susan Garza's Aji Tangerine beside Sugar Rush Peach Stripey in her Western Washington garden. Saved Aji Tangerine seed from that patch produced striped fruit when Elena Kadomtseva grew it out; the orange pods with red stripes were named Tangerine Tiger. Seed has circulated among U.S. hobby vendors ever since, still segregating into long, stubby, stripeless, and yellow types.