Hot Pepper, 'Buena Mulata'

(Capsicum anuum) 'Buena Mulata' is a stunner of a cayenne-type that bears prolifically on tall plants. Fruits start deep purple and morph through a rainbow of creamy yellow, salmon, and orange before fully maturing to red. Plants are quite ornamental, hanging with fruits of all maturity stages simultaneously. Depending on how they are to be used and what flavors you prefer to highlight, they can be eaten at any stage (more savory and vegetal towards the purple side of maturity, more sweet and fruity towards the red end), but they pack plenty of heat at any stage. Happily, the story of these peppers is beginning to be well-known and widespread. They trace back through Horace Pippin, one of the most influential American artists of the first half of the 20th century, a self-taught painter whose work spans subjects of war, racial segregation, landscape, and portraiture. Fortunately for us, his legacy is also a window into the culinary and agricultural tradition of the Black community of th