spice question

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kevinv1

Assistant Cook
Joined
May 10, 2009
Messages
4
Location
ontario canada
I keep seeing sweet papreka, smoked papreka, hot papreka, hungarian papreka, red papreka. I know what smoked papreka is now, and have found it at the store. But what is the others?
 
Sweet= not really "sweet", just means mild.
Smoked= the chiles have been smoked with usually oak before they are dried.
Hungarian= hot pods, like a mild cayenne.
Red= .....could be anything from eraser dust to dried ground bell pepper. (run away!)

In short, buy quality Paprika from a reputable dealer like Pendzy's or MySpicer.

http://www.penzeys.com/
http://www.myspicer.com/catalog/
 
Well I had a brief fling with regular old Hungarian Paprika a few years back. Didnt seem to be blessed with much detectable flavor at all let alone any form of heat. Now I have been led to believe Hot Hungarian is the regular version to which cayene has been added. Somebody straighten out my thiinning here. Thanks.

bigwheel
 
The variations "should" come from the differences in the soil/climate that the pepper is grown in, plus the varieties of the Paprika pepper plants.
Like someone on here said, "Paprika tastes like dirt", which I agree with. I have grown my own, then dried and ground them up for some of the best tasting Paprika. Way better than the store stuff.
 
Well can heartily endorse the make it yourself strategy. Also applies to most other stuff in the world of culinary delights. Great point.

bigwheel
 
Well the urban legend I heard say not too long back Spanish paprika was rumored to be used for color and had not flavor whereas the Hungarian version was supposed to have some. Nowadays I have heard folks chatting about some super high dollar Spanish Paprika which supposed to taste real good. Now the chili cooks buy highly expunsive decorative paprika from Sunny CA and which is sold according to its redness scale. Very pricey if you want the reddest of the red brightest etc. They have a rating scale for it. Would take a wild guess it purty bland tasting. In fact I know it is cuz I use San Antone Red from Penderys and it full of the bright paprika and how it got it's name. It is fairly bland.

bigwheel
 

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