Debating the world’s hottest chile pepper
This cool article from the Dorset Echo out of England is a rather interesting take on one part of this whole new “controversy” about the world’s hottest pepper(s).
Heated debate over world’s hottest chilli
By Rene GerrytsWHAT’S hot and what’s not in the world of chillis is the subject of heated debate after the announcement that there’s a new firecracker in town.
The New Mexico State University Chile Pepper Institute has certified the Bhut Jolokia or ‘ghost chilli’ from India as the hottest ever tested, knocking West Dorset-grown Dorset Naga off the top spot.
The ghost chilli tested at 1,001,304 Scoville Heat Units (SHUs) while the Dorset Naga tipped the scales at 923,000 when it was tested last year.
But Michael Michaud, of West Bexington, remains unconcerned by the coup – and is convinced they are genetically the same chilli. He said geographically the original chillis come from near each other and look the same.
He said: “How much heat do you want? I suppose we care, but it’s all been a bit of fun -it’s not world peace. It’s just a bloody hot chilli and we are having fun with it. Ours could be just as hot this year or even hotter at 1.6 million, so what am I bothered about?”
“We are not going to get into the race for the Moon on this, you know. It’s the luck of the draw – the heat depends so much on the environmental conditions.”
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Commented at March 16, 2007- 5:35 am
It was clear that whoever would receive Guinness fame for the world’s hottest pepper would leave sour grapes with the other players in this field. Dorset claims they started with their version 2001 after finding an extremely hot Naga at a UK oriental store (they have lots of Bangladeshis there). Why didn’t they come forward at that time? It was around 2000/2001 when rumors were flying about a new superhot pepper from India, and Dorset could have helped shedding light on it back then. Bosland invested the most work on this subject, so IMHO, credit for NMSU is well deserved I would agree though that Bih, Bhut, Morich, etc. are closely related. And 1,001,304 or 923,000 SHU really doesn’t matter – that’s all within the HPLC’s error tolerance and boils down to “about 1 Million SHU” for either Naga flavor. From our first growing tests though, we noticed differences between the various Naga incarnations – fruit shape, number of blossoms per node, etc. This summer’s test crop at various chile gardeners (inluding me) will reveal more details. Possibly it’s like with the Scotch Bonnet – different shapes, even colors, whereyever you go, but heat in the same ball park.
Commented at March 16, 2007- 4:02 pm
Hi Harald! I’ve got about 150 of them going into the fields this year with many more planned for the next. I’ll send you pics for comparison on how they grown here in Indiana.
Commented at March 21, 2007- 11:23 am
To the Michaud’s credit, they found the very existence of a “hot sauce industry” to be a surprise. They were shocked to discover that anyone other than other botanists would even care about their little pepper; that’s why THEY seem to have been silent. Fwiw, the Michaud’s have been quite classy about the whole thing.
On the other hand, Dr. Bosland has had the chili since 2001, yet left the world including Dave DeWitt at Fiery Foods believing that the Naga Jolokia story was either a hoax or the Indian scientists cheated. Why is that?
And I might add… He is claiming to have “discovered” something that millions of Indians and Bangladeshis have known about for a very long time. He didn’t discover this any more than the Michauds did.