Plant · P-224

Rocoto Pepper

Capsicum pubescens

Rocoto Pepper, also called locoto, is an Andean tree pepper that produces thick-fleshed, pungent fruit with distinctive black seeds, eaten raw, cooked, stuffed and baked Peruvian-style, or dried and ground. It has a genuine medicinal use too, taken internally for fever, weakness and digestive complaints and used externally for sprains and neuralgia. Unlike most peppers, it isn't summer heat that shuts it down but warm nights: it needs cool nights to set flowers, so a hot summer produces plenty of healthy foliage and almost no pods, leaving spring and fall as its real harvest windows. It is also long-lived where winters stay mild, capable of fruiting for up to fifteen years, though it needs afternoon shade and frost protection to get anywhere near that in a harsher climate.