Firecracker Farm is family owned and operated in Palm City, Florida where we grow and harvest super hot Ghost, Carolina Reaper, and Trinidad Moruga Scorpion peppers, year-round. Schedule a visit for a tasting, we’d love to show you around.
From planting, growing, and harvesting our peppers, to developing, designing, and producing our products, it’s done by us right here… One small batch at a time. It’s a high-touch, craft operation that we handle with the care and enthusiasm that only a family business can.
We are focused on exceptional quality and flavor to provide a refined experience for Hot Pepper and food enthusiasts alike. Our objective is to make your experience with our peppers a delight – From the look and feel of the packaging to the lingering savory heat of our finest blends.
Our hot pepper story is several generations in the making. It began sometime in the 1890’s in Sicily, with my great grandparents, the Garafolos, and carries on today with our children.
When the Garafolo’s left their country life for the greener pastures of the new world they made Brooklyn, New York their home and brought a love for hot peppers with them. Their daughter, my paternal grandmother became the family matriarch. The boss, full stop.
In addition to being an enterprising, quick-witted, loving sage of a woman, she happened to have a habit of eating Habanero and Scotch Bonnet sauce well into her 90s. Never one to brag or draw attention to herself, she was a stealth pepper aficionado.
Perhaps the vaunted benefits of capsaicin contributed to her excellent physical and mental health, good looks, and charm. You see where I’m going with this…
Following in family tradition, my father also developed a love for heat, sipping Tabasco from a spoon in the pantry when no one was looking then graduating to growing Habaneros. He introduced me to peppers significantly hotter than Jalapeno when I was ten years old and I have enjoyed hot food ever since.
Before the days of homeschooling our five children and growing hot peppers, my wife Jackie and I owned and operated NYC’s premiere food photo studio, Shooting Kitchen. We served clients like Food Network, Bon Appétit, Rachel Ray, Chobani, and Bobby Flay.
At the same time, we also served our e-commerce, production, media, and Ad agency clients through our Web & Application Development consultancy, HAAS/créa. We have launched brands like Nourish Snacks, Prismsport, and Ramy Brook and serve long term parters like Countdown Entertainment for the Times Square New Year’s Eve Ball Drop celebration, live stream and media microsites. HAAS continues to provide NYC’s and LA’s leading production companies and enterprises like LiveX Productions and Leverage Management with web applications that scale to an audience of millions to this day.
All this is to say, we have a long history of making cool things for clients, at the highest levels but now, for the first time, we have the good fortune of being our own clients.
It was about 2009 when I had my first foray into making a hot pepper product. The item in question was a tasty sauce made as a promotional item for the famous chefs and food magazine editors who were our clients at Shooting Kitchen. It featured wax-sealed bottles and we called it Sweet Heat for its Habanero, Ancho, Mulatto, and honey burn.
Many years later, I learned that my brother had started growing his own Trinidad Moruga Scorpions. When I received word that my father was also growing plants from my brother’s Scorpion seeds I wanted to participate and join their effort.
My dad prepared a nice “how to” note with some seeds and tucked them into a letter to me. The handful of seeds and instructions carried more than the raw material for plants, they held the potential for ideas that had been dormant beneath the surface, waiting to germinate.
All at once, I imagined taking my love for cooking, hot pepper, and food in general and pairing it with my years of experience with media, branding, graphic design, marketing, web, and e-commerce. I decided on the spot that when the time was right I would grow peppers and make exclusive craft products for a brand of our own… and the fun begins.
When our Super Hot Peppers began to grow, ideas, designs, and products grew around them. As consumers, creators, designers, and marketers of our own product, for a change we’re the client and consumer — completely free to take our ideas and whims to the edge. We focus on the details, push limits, refine processes, and select the best materials and methods for our efforts. With the normal constraints lifted, we engage in an unregulated pursuit of perfection and satisfaction.
To this end, we have focused on growing and developing products based on our three favorite Super Hot Pepper varieties which we call “The Three Kings”.
The look, delivery methods, flavor, and experience of our blends are unlike anything else available on the market… and they’re so good, we’ve been told they’re addictive.
Since this is really my folly, I’ve gone all in on what I love:
Articulate, crisp delivery, exquisite flavors, refined presentation, arresting design and edgy messaging that pushes the envelope while having fun and answering to no one… It’s HOT.
I hope you enjoy.
Thank you!
Alex
Alexander Bonamarte
Farmer / Maker of many things
Bonamarte Enterprises LLC, Firecracker Farm
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Operation 300 serves Gold Star Children & Families through mentorship programs and camps, honoring the sacrifice that has been made by their family .
GROWERS & PURVEYORS OF EXOTIC, ULTRA HOT PEPPERS.
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