Open fields is an annual event hosted by Jim Campbell in Indiana. Jim is a fireman who in the course of a history of cooking for his fellow firefolk started making his own hotsauces. After a while he also started growing his own chiles. As years progressed the amount of land devoted to growing chiles expanded, and he soon found himself in the hotsauce business (Dried and smoked chiles included, see http://www.wildpepper.com/ ) Eventually his crop exceeded his ability to harvest, and Jim came up with the idea of opening up his chile patch to anyone who wanted to come and pick as many chiles as they could carry. Thusly "Open Fields" was created, and every September Indiana is trampled by crazed sweaty chileheads clamoring for their share of chiles and adult beverage induced tall tales (So I'm told, have not made it there myself...) On Fri, 14 Jan 2005 07:35:30 -0800, HolySmokes wrote > Ok, I'm outed. > Been lurking here awhile, and while I'm old and wrinkled enough > to look like some of my own smoked chiles, I'm new to the list. > > Two questions after the recent flurry of posts: > > 1) this 'open fields'... an event, festival, gathering, ? Would > someone please shed some light for us? When, where, what, how, why? > acting like lunatics? Sounds right up our alley! > > 2) seed sources... other than blindly searching the web (which I've > done), and there seem to be plenty of sources worldwide... and > reading the archives... what are good recommendations for chile seed > sources in the US? It's hard to pick based on what the websites > look like, and there must be folks on the list who sell seeds? > > thanks much! > Dugal (aka HolySmokes) > Shoreline, WA -- =Mark http://www.exit109.com/~mstevens