The Making of the 2024 Special Reserve

SpiceQuest began in June of 2024. There was no warm up period or quiet ramp. From the start, it felt like being dropped into deep water. Boxes of peppers arrived from growers across the country. Some came from people I had known for years. Others came from names I learned as I went. None of it felt predictable. Each shipment carried something I had never seen before.

RB003 with its sharp color. Dragon’s Breath with its tight, coiled shape. Big Mustard Mama with its heavy folds. Naga 7 Pot Bubblegum Peach with a skin that looked almost painted. Smooky Rainbow. Frankenstein BBG. White Habanero. Red Hydra. Every box brought a pepper that felt like its own world, and each one demanded the kind of attention you give to something rare.

This was the first season. The first real harvest for the company. There was nothing routine about it. Everything was new, and every pepper forced a decision. Keep it. Release it. Set some aside. Go back to the grower and ask for more while they still had it.

From all of that, we built our monthly drops. Small runs, each from a single pepper. Many of them sold out in days. I stored a little aside from some batches. In other cases, I went back to the growers after the season and picked up more from the same stock. Everything stayed fresh. Some peppers were frozen at their peak and dehydrated only recently. None of this sat around gathering dust.

By the end of the season, I had enough set aside to try something new. A blend pulled from the best of the year. Not the hottest. Not the mildest. Just the peppers that had stood out in simple, concrete ways. How they hit the tongue. How long they held on. How clean they tasted when crushed.

The challenge was straightforward. Find a combination that did not flatten the character of the peppers. Some had bright fruit notes. Some had a deep burn. Some broke fast then settled. It took time to find a ratio that kept those traits intact. After a dozen rounds of testing, we landed on something that tasted like the year itself. Warm. Crisp. With a steady climb. I would place it at a six or seven on the heat scale. Enough to feel real, but not violent.

Once the blend felt right, the rest of the work began. This part was slower. Everything had to be built by hand. We designed a new box. A new label with a gold foil seal. A new matte black grinder. An acrylic case that holds the grinder like a preserved specimen. None of this was automated. Every grinder had to be assembled, cleaned, filled, sealed, and set into its case by hand. It takes a long time, but it feels right for something that comes from a year of hard work by so many growers.

The Special Reserve is not meant to be a mass product. It is a record of a single season. A physical one. Something you can set on a table, open, and taste. The heat is real. The spice is crisp. You can sense the work of the growers in each grind. The entire goal was simple. Collect the best peppers from the year, treat them with care, and release them while they are still at their peak.

We will do this again if we can. Each harvest is different. Some peppers return. Some do not. That is what makes this first release special. It comes from the first full season of SpiceQuest. A season that surprised me more than I expected. A season that reminded me how much life a single pepper can hold when someone on the other end of the country grows it with skill and focus.

The 2024 Special Reserve is the result. A small run. Built by hand. Made from peppers that earned their place through simple things. Heat. Flavor. Character. Nothing more complicated than that.

If future seasons give us peppers like these, then we will continue this series. If not, then this first release will stand on its own. Either way, it comes from a real year, real growers, and the kind of peppers that refuse to be forgotten once you taste them.