I grow Szechuan peppercorns in my garden as I love the taste of this distinctive spice. Szechuan pepper is one of the ingredients in traditional 5 spice and one I can not live without in my spice apothecary. When I found out it grows in my zone I was thrilled and bought two small specimens from Portland nursery (PDX). This last year I got what I would call a bumper crop and of course used it all up over the winter. This year looks like a sad crop but at least I have some getting ready to turn red.
The Szechuan peppercorn plant is thorny with an interesting growing habit, it gets about six feet tall and trails off in a what seems to be a rather wild blackberry habit (above ground, it's not a vine) and then fills in, mine are large. The peppercorns have a mouth-numbing effect with a hint of that very recognizable Szechuan flavor. It's the outer red flesh that is used in cooking and it comes right off when it dries exposing a solid black seed.
I grow my Szechuan peppercorn plants as part of the underbrush (permaculture setup here) of a mature English walnut, along with two types of figs and berries bushes, they are thriving.
If you have a zone that can support this spice it is well worth it.
Bring on the heat. ;)
Cool! I had no idea that people grew it here. It's one of the strangest-tasting individual spices I've ever encountered. In conjunction with 5 spice/ chinese style cooking it is incredible though!
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I've planted a lot of stuff (edibles ) native to China and Russia as they are cold hearty and bear goodies (also, non-invasive so it's a full circle of love).
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Yum! I love Szechuan, what a interesting thing to grow and near a walnut! Inspiring as always, thanks for the post @mamadini!
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I really experiment a lot with growing guilds, especially with some of the more exotic stuff that really has not had the time to become tied to "old wisdom" here -- so far these love the walnut tree and half day sun as they are very large and thriving. :)
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Thats great.
i guess you'll be able to raise and sell plants for other people soon
i think it can only be grown using fresh seeds
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I have a horde of seeds to play around with.... SPC would make an awesome border fence because of the fierce thorns, a bonus in my eyes. :)
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