Joe’s Ranch Grows St. Johns County’s Datil Pepper Tradition

The datil pepper may be small, but growing it commercially is anything but. Out at Joe’s Ranch in Molasses Junction, rows of one of St. Johns County’s most recognizable crops are being tended by local grower Jack Blocker, who has taken something long associated with backyard gardens, family recipes and St. Augustine folklore and turned it into a commercial farming operation. For generations, local tradition has linked the datil pepper to the Minorcan families who settled in St. Augustine in the late 1700s. While the pepper’s exact path to Northeast Florida is still debated, its place in local food culture is not. Datils became deeply woven into Minorcan cooking and eventually into the broader culinary identity of St. Johns County. In 2013, the St. Johns County Board of County Commissioners designated the datil pepper plant as the county’s official plant and proclaimed the first Saturday of October as Datil Pepper Day.

The farming partnership began after ranch owner Joe Tringali heard repeatedly about Blocker’s green thumb. Tringali had the land and an interest in growing something distinctly local; Blocker had the agricultural know-how and an interest in farming datils. Tringali offered to install the infrastructure, including the farm’s fertilization system, and let Blocker take the lead on the peppers.

Commercial datil production also reveals just how much work goes into a pepper most of us barely think about once it reaches a bottle of sauce. Last season, Blocker tended approximately 2,000 plants at Joe’s Ranch; this year’s crop includes about 1,150. Harvesting is remarkably hands-on. According to Tringali, a single pound can contain roughly 220 to 230 datil peppers, each picked individually and then destemmed. Even an experienced picker may harvest only about five pounds in an hour. It is a reminder that behind every bulk order of locally grown datils are hundreds — sometimes thousands — of peppers handled one at a time. The growing process is equally specialized. Blocker has worked closely with UF/IFAS Extension St. Johns County on soil quality, plant health, irrigation and water and tissue sampling, using agricultural science to support the crop from the ground up. Much of the harvest ultimately goes to commercial customers who turn the peppers into the sauces and specialty products for which datils have become known. Some orders reach 100 pounds at a time. Tringali says the ranch has intentionally stayed on the growing side of the business rather than producing its own sauce, allowing the farm to supply other local makers instead of competing with them.

For Blocker, though, the motivation reaches beyond production. “It all started to try to help preserve the St. Johns County heritage with the seeds that I have grown, handed down from generations of my family.” That mix of family tradition and modern agriculture is what makes the operation at Joe’s Ranch so distinctly local. And this fall, residents can take a little of that tradition home with them. Joe’s Ranch will be at the 3rd Annual Datil Fest in Palatka on November 14, 2026, where visitors can purchase locally grown datil peppers — or even a full plant and try their hand at growing St. Johns County’s favorite pepper in their own backyard.