A local (not a chain) store sells a product that look almost exactly like that, but I think it carried the Old El Paso brand name. I'll check next time I see them. I don't remember if they had many seeds or not.

Out of curiousity, I was paging thru a Harris Seed catalog earlier and looking for similar peppers. I wondered if they were Banana Bill F1 peppers. BBs ripen from light yellow to red (going through a bright yellow and an orange stage if the photo is correct). Based on your linked web site, it looks like I should be looking for 3 different, but similar peppers, probably with the yellow, red, and orange as ripened colors. Also the Banana Bills sound like they are too big.

I'll be interested to hear others ideas and if the varieties are available to the public.

Check this thread...

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/cornucop/msg0514401028799.html

I have a saved seed from a similar, but not same, pepper as the "vine sweet"/"master's touch" etc. peppers. It took a journey of discovery in that thread to figure it out, though...

The quality of pepper I got out of my seeds was close to, but not as sweet as the "master's touch" peppers, though it did have more of a chili-pepper-like flavor (not heat) to its profile along with a sweetness quality greater than most bells I've tried.

Granted, the "knockoff sweets" I grew my peppers out of were not those peppers, but I got something worth keeping out of it. I grew 2 plantings last year (1 from the original harvested seed and 1 from the offspring of the "mystery hybrid" seed). Both came out true to type compared to each other.

I look forward to growing my 3rd (f4) line out to see if it remains true to type as well as seeing if my hybridization with a romanian sweet pepper can produce a nice quality "red" to go with my orange supersweet without changing the taste/vigor in a negative way.

Peppers take up such little room and do well in pots, so if you're interested it shouldn't be too much hassle to see what you can get out of it. Start 2-3 seeds to a cell, clip out all but the most robust after spouting, and set your mystery plant(s) out to grow once big enough. Have fun...

-note- In that thread i also mention a near perfect mini-bell that showed on the plant, but the seeds harvested from the very few it produced did not germinate. Also, A friend had one plant produce some "reds" but they were small compared to the robust "oranges".

Thanks for your followups.

I did read, with great interest, the thread on the other forum. And, no doubt I feel compelled to germinate the few seeds I've been able to reap.

I can't get over how tasty these peppers are. I continue to quest for the perfect peppers. I'm just amazed that I found such a fantastic pepper at Sam's Club no less. I have tried MANY peppers in my day, but this is definitely a good find. I was therefore so disappointed when I found out that they were un-duplicatable. And I'm not sure they are.....

NC, you are correct. I must germinate the few seeds that I've been able to get and see if I can at least grow a pepper that's reasonably close.

My experiment has yielded me a keeper and something I plan to cross (as half assed as it may be in effort) through the years in order to see if I can make an improvement worth keeping.

I'm seeing if i get a "red" out of a cross with a pepper right now (cross made on a whim from a friend's pepper). More importantly, I'd like to cross and stabilize a longer version of the pepper, but pepper breeding isn't high on my "to do" list right now.

What's most important to me is the seed I collected from the original source has produced a seemingly stable OP offspring.

I have a keeper that may be inferior to some of the super-sweet hybrid peppers out there, but it has enough positive qualities to make it worth growing.

Hi there,

Two years ago I bought these peppers from costco and saved the seeds. The following spring I started the seeds and received several plants busting with these little peppers. I wouldn't be deterred from planting seeds just because they are said to be hybrids. If you plant enough you will see some great results. Here are some from my 2008 garden: {{gwi:1152431}}From Garden 2008

{{gwi:1152434}}From Garden 2008
{{gwi:1152438}}From Garden 2008
{{gwi:1152439}}From Garden 2008

Nice!

So many peppers so little space. After last summer and 2 growing sessions with friends around the US who helped me "trial" some things I'm just down to 1 single sweet pepper project and I'm done with it. It's being "trialed" out by friends as a possible final selection if I get close-enough reports back from these people on the seed/plants.

I pretty much have something I want at this point and the experimentation with other breeding peppers just aren't going as swiftly as I liked or predicted.

I was really excited about some of my other breeding projects, but things were just too damn variable...especially plant vigor.

Fwiw, here's my keeper. It's not from the stock that my version of a "vine sweet" was taken from, though. I liked what I got off the "vine sweets", but my hybrid attempts with them didn't make anything good (limited attempts) and my 'orange supersweet' (pictured below) from another hybridization experiment produced smoother/thicker and more uniform-sized pods.

Last year while searching for peppers such as these, I found seeds at Redwood City Seed Company, web address is http://ecoseeds.com/. The variety is called Dulcetta peppers which I think are probably hybrids, but I am not sure. I was very impressed and am growing them again this year with seeds I had left over. The peppers grew all of one color per plant...red, yellow and orange. I didn't bother saving seeds as I knew I still had some, and honestly I cannot remember how many seeds they had. Hope this helps.

I love these things! Let me know how things go with the few seeds you were able to get. =)

inurb - nice photos and beautiful sweets!

nc-cm - I hope the grow out is successful. I do indeed love sweet peppers.

I also bought these a couple of years ago at my local publix,I agree that dulcetta is the closest thing i could find to them. I did save the few seeds that were in there and grew them out..they all grew true to the color of the pod taken from.
Kevin

the pepper looks like my gypsy pepper plant that now has about 12 peppers on it. I hope it is because it sure sound great.

I have a healthy plant growing this year from a vine sweet pepper from a couple years ago. It's blooming like crazy and cant wait to taste these sweet gems.

In mid-summer I purchased a bag of multi-colored mini sweet peppers at Costco. Great colors and taste. Though it was very late, I thought I'd try growing some in a two gallon pot. Today I picked four of them, red, orange and yellow. I'm going to save the seeds and try them again next season.

Reading this has helped me so much. This is my first try at growing these vine sweet peppers.