Global Warming – Fiery Foods go Mainstream in German-Speaking Europe

As promised, here’s a little report how chiles and fiery foods are becoming mainstream in Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

About 15 years ago, it was tough finding even sliced jalapenos, nacho chips or other hot sauce than Tabasco over here. That started to change slowly in the 1990’s, and it’s been less than ten years that fiery foods really started to take off the in former land of the bland. We can humbly say that it helped that Pepperworld took their hot shop business from the U.S. to Europe. In the first few years, we got what marketeers call the “early adopters” – consumers who love trying out new things and being the first kid on the block with new stuff. And as we all know, once you start eating hot & spicy, there’s no way back…

Soon we got attention by the media, and besides frequent nationwide TV appearances, we even got nice coverage in the German editions of Men’s Health and PLAYBOY. The major burger chains tested the water with hot & spicy special editions of their products, which now show up on their menus on a regular basis, and an increasing number of restaurant chefs dares to put spicy items on their menus as well. Of course our Pepperworld Hot Shop got competition, too. But that’s OK with us, as the number of chile lovers had grown tremendously over the last couple of years – slowly but surely hot peppers became mainstream and weren’t just for a handful of hardcore chileheads anymore (although these are a growing community here, too, of course).

The sudden pepper popularity can be witnessed by more or less hot & spicy products of huge food corporations. And when the “big wigs” decide that customers in a certain territory are ready for chile-related products, you can be sure they spent serious money on market research first. So here’s a sampling of mainstream products from German-speaking Europe.

Unilever Deutschland GmbH added the spicy “Paprika Peperoni” variety to their popular “Brunch” line of spreads. Specialty foods manufacturer Appel created a spicy version of their canned sardines, kicked up with “piri-piri”, the Portuguese version of hot peppers. Austrian food company Mautner Markhof licensed the Tabasco brand name and put the well-known “Red Pepper Sauce” in one of their mustards. Also from Austria comes “Höllenfeuer Ketchup” – hellfire may be a little exaggerated, but for a consumer product, this condiment is surprisingly hot. German candy maker Villosa has been making liquorice candies for more than 100 years – a hard candy product named “Sallos Explosiv” is kicked up nicely with the mighty pod.

Speaking of sweet stuff, the culinary mating of hot chiles and chocolate is an ancient one, already in use by the Aztecs and Maya. These days, this spicy-sweet combination is more popular than ever, and almost every month a new chile-spiced chocolate specialty is being released. Our picture shows just a small selection available here, including one by Swiss chocolatier Lindt with a liquid chile-cherry filling, and a quite fiery dark chocholate with crunchy candied habanerossticking to the bottom side.
Another novelty is chocolate & chile ice cream, offered this summer at many ice cream parlors here.

Famous food magnate Dr. Oetker (”quality is the best recipe”) is well known for their baking mixes. Earlier this year they expanded that line with a “Chocolate Chili” mix, including paper cups to bake eight muffins. We bought a package and baked the muffins – see picture. The cake isn’t really hot, but delicious, and indeed with a nice chile kick to it. “Chocolate Chili” baking mix on German supermarket shelves – amazing, isn”t it?

Another classic combo is of course peppers and cheese. Cheese manufacturers have discovered the heated-up market as well, and we’re seeing an increasing number of excellent cheeses with hot and mild peppers. For example, here’s “Bonifaz Pepperoni”, a spicy brie by Bavaria-based cheese maker Bergader. Some of the chile cheeses available here are slightly smoked, resulting in a great taste. None of the companies here dared to come up with a really hot cheese, like Cabot’s wonderful “Hot Habanero Cheddar Cheese, made in Vermont.

But as you can tell, we’re enjoying quite a few unique spicy products made over here, in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. More than 500 years ago, chiles spread around the world like a wildfire. Now that consumers (and manufacturers) are discovering their love for them in almost every country, hot peppers account once more for a wave of global warming.

Next time we’ll start reviewing some interesting products that we’re importing for the Pepperworld Hot Shop from the U.S. and elsewhere. Stay hot!