Urfa Biber

[Mary-Anne Durkee]

I adore Aleppo and often use it.Anyway, I just read of a new to me chile, Urfa Biber.

Has anyone used it?

Wikipedia says: Urfa biber (also known as Isot pepper) is a dried Turkish
pepper of the type Capsicum annuum cultivated in the Urfa region of Turkey. It
is often described as having a smoky, 'raisin-like' taste.

Urfa biber is technically a red pepper, ripening to a dark maroon on the plant.
The peppers go through a two-part process, where they are sun-dried during the
day and wrapped tightly at night. The night process is called 'sweating', and
works to infuse the dried flesh with the remaining moisture of the pepper.

The result is an appearance ranging from deep purple to a dark, purplish black.
Urfa biber is less spicy than many other chile peppers, but provides a more
lasting build of heat.

Traditionally used in Turkey in meat and savoury foods, because of its fruity
overtones, it is becoming popular in to use in sweet dishes in North America.

Sounds wonderful!

Mary-Anne in gloomy rainy SF Bay Area


--

[Walter Spencer]

Brilliant info on this interesting chili in Wilkipedia. The free encyclopedia. Lots of leads as to how to use it and where to buy it. Apparently not a hot one, but with loads of flavour. Quite a few recipes available too.  Thanks for listing it Mary-Anne. Thanks for brightening the pages for us Chiliheads that are stuck in one place.  Walt. An old chilihead from the old country.

 

 

 

From: Mary-Anne Durkee

To: Chile Heads

Cc: chile...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Friday, November 18, 2011 11:34 PM

Subject: [ChileHeads] Urfa Biber

[Scott MacEslin]

I grow these peppers in my garden and they really are wonderful. We
don't live in Urfa, but Adana which has a similar climate. Very
similar in flavor (but hotter) than tabasco peppers.

[Alex Silbajoris]

We have a few groceries (Turkish, Palestinian, Russian) stocking various pepper-based products like marinated roasted peppers or pepper-vegetable sauces - those BTW make a great secret ingredient for pasta sauces.  The labels never say exactly what kinds of red peppers they're using, but as described for the Urfa, they're flavorful but not killer hot.

If you see a jar of something called ajvar, try it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ajvar

You may also see something called Zacusca.  Then you start getting into labels entirely in Cyrillic, which I can sound out; we have a jar on the shelf of something that sounds like "nezhin" (which is amusingly close to Lithuanian for "doesn't know").  Sometimes labels are in Georgian script.  Fortunately the producers anticipate a multilingual market, so they usually have an illustration of the ingredients on the label.

[Sandy Olson]

Yowzer, another pepper that won't kill off the Moderate Corps!  Now, to find somewhere that sells them.  In rural Iowa OR in South Texas, Turkish groceries are in the 'hard to locate' category ;^)

 

SandyO

CH #1146 and Grand Pooh Bear of the Moderate Corps

[Sandy Olson]

Now why didn't I think of that, Risa???  Any ideas of good pepper purveyors who might have them.  John?  Maybe he isn't on this list; I'll try the original CH list too.

 

SandyO

CH #1146, on the hunt for Urfa Biber

[Peter Hirsch]

For the last 2 years, I have been habituating several Turkish
restaurants (and a some from other countries it the same general area
- Lebanese in particular) in the neighborhoods adjoining where I work
and have found that there is often a shaker on the table with crushed
pepper that is deep red, almost black, in color, It has little heat,
but tastes great on absolutely anything and everything. I assumed that
it was aleppo, since I had run into it sometime ago and enjoyed its
flavor. A week or so ago, I noticed a market in the same area that
looked like it had just opened. This place had lots of open barrels,
bins and other containers of olives, pickles, spices and other good
stuff. In the spice area, I spotted what looks like the same pepper
flakes that I liked so much at the restaurants and the card by the
basin containing the pepper said "Marash". I think this is the same as
the Urfa Biberi, or pretty damn close to it on the basis of a little
looking around that I did which came up with this link that identifies
Marash as "Maraş biberi". If you read through the article, you will
see mention of another pepper that is similar but much hotter that
comes from Şanlıurfa, so maybe that is the Urfa Biberi, though the
consensus seems to be that Biberi is of the mild persuasion.

Maybe someone knows more about the identities of Urfa and Marash and
how much they may overlap.

BTW, my NYC windowsill habs are finally ripening, in LATE NOVEMBER!
Amazing how I can do just about everything wrong and still have a
couple dozen green beauties that are slowly turning orange, despite
lack of adequate light, poor feeding and probably too much or too
little watering (I really am just groping my way along, but am
learning a lot from my plants).

In heat,

Punto

[Peter Hirsch]

A just dug a little further information on the relation of Urfa to
Marash (or Maras) from
http://www.silvercloudestates.com/product/Urfa-or-Urfa-Biber-Pepper-Flakes-312.aspx

According to it, the Maras and Aleppo varieties are milder than the
Urfa, though anyone's guess is as good as mine judging what is meant
by hot or mild in an advertising blurb. Since the drift of what I have
read on this list seems to indicate that the Urfa biberi is pretty
mild, that would appear to put Maras practically into negative scovie
territory. Who knows?

Punto

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[=Mark]

This be Justin's hot older sister?

On Fri, 18 Nov 2011 15:34:17 -0800, Mary-Anne Durkee wrote

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=Mark

[Scott MacEslin]

The peppers I grow are a cross between The maras and urfa peppers.
They are extremely hot, but flavorful. They are considered an annual,
but have had the same plants for four years now. The climate in Adana
(about 100 miles from Kahramamaras) allows for a long growing season.
Highly recommended pepper (biber is Turkish for pepper).