Meet Carlos Carvajal, our “Doctor Salsas”.
With a mother from Granada and a father from the USA, he is passionate about growing chillies and is an enthusiast who wants to change the rules in the world of hot peppers.
His passion for discovering this world of new flavours dates back to his university days. The only time he had ever tasted spicy food was in the military, but when he arrived at the University of California, and at the insistence of his friends, he began not only to be a regular consumer of hot dishes, but to create them.
From Mexico, the birthplace of the hot pepper, he learned about a culture that revolves around chillies, the different ways of introducing them into food and the value of the capsicum varieties of his homeland.
He was surprised by the multicultural variety of California, which allows the cultivation and knowledge of a multitude of chillies from: Jamaica, Trinidad, Columbia, Thailand, Vietnam, Iraq, Iran, Israel, Yemen, Eastern Europe…
The fusion of these experiences is what allows him today to have the unique, special and characteristic style that only Carlos Carvajal has.
His own character, cultivated over 18 years, was the key to being able to start a new adventure in Spain, a country where, when Carlos arrived in 2010, he still had more to learn about the world of spice.
From here he began his struggle to bring the “real heat”. All the products that were marketed at that time and were said to be spicy were, in Carlos’ words, “chungo” (lousy) and “pure vinegar”.
He has now been in Spain for 12 years, growing in Granada. One of the secrets of his plantations is the water he uses to grow his crops, which comes from the Sierra Nevada, and Andalusia’s climate makes it a perfect place for this type of plantation.
This adventure has earned him the nickname “Doctor Salsas”, a very special doctor who puts all his knowledge and enthusiasm into making us buzz with his products and teaching us that hot sauce is just as good, or better, in lentils as in an enchilada.