The popularity of mini sweet snacking peppers is steadily increasing. The red, yellow and orange colors look very appealing to consumers and it’s a healthy, tasty convenient snack for people on-the-go. What does it take to develop mini sweet peppers that meet the needs of both retailers and consumers? In addition to a great flavor, excellent post-harvest quality and a uniform size, sweet pepper breeders look at maturity.
Ana Saballos, Sweet Pepper Breeder for Sakata Seed .
Same harvest time
“A bag of mixed, bright-colored mini sweet snack peppers looks very inviting, but it means all three colors need to be ready to be harvested at the same time,” says Ana Saballos, Sweet Pepper Breeder with Sakata Seed and based in Florida. “We’ve developed three different genotypes of hybrids – red, yellow and orange - that all meet the same maturity.” This new snacking pepper series is umbrellaed under the name “Sunakku” which means “snack” in Japanese. There are three colors: Sunakku Ichigo (red), Sunakku Yuzu (yellow) and Sunakku Mikan (orange).
In addition to the similar maturity, these healthy treats contain very little seeds, making them ideal for snacking, salads, stir-fries, grilling and great for creative cuisine.
Longer cycle
The varieties were developed in Europe, mainly for indoor production. “However, they also perform well in certain outdoor conditions,” said Saballos. Depending on the production conditions, in certain indoor environments, the plants allow for about 10-15 harvests, while outdoors the number of harvests is about five. “The Sunakku range is well suited for long cycle production,” Saballos shared.
For more information:
Alicia Suits
Sakata Seed America, Inc.
Tel: +1 (408) 778-7758
asuits@sakata.com
www.sakata.com