The Datil Pepper of Saint Augustine
Saint Augustine is the oldest continuously settled European city in the United States, and the Datil Pepper grows here and almost nowhere else on Earth. Nobody quite agrees on how it arrived. Tradition says the Minorcans carried it, the survivors of the New Smyrna colony who won their freedom in the courts and made their way north to Saint Augustine in 1777. Others say it came through Cuba a century later. What everyone agrees on is what came next: generations of Minorcan cooking built around a pepper with real warmth and a sweetness all its own, from clam chowder to pilau to the sauce bottles handed down at family tables.
Old City Pepper Company is one of those tables. We make small-batch Datil Pepper sauce, Datil mustard, and Datil Pepper jelly from a generations-old family recipe, with peppers grown right here in Saint Augustine. Our shop is on St. George Street in the historic district. Stop in and say hello, or order online and we'll ship it anywhere in the country.