Hot Chili Peppers in the Glistening Sun
If you aren’t familiar with the small, orange beauties pictured here, these are Habaneros, one of the hottest of the chili peppers. Picked just days ago, these will be added two or three at a time to fresh batches of my homemade salsa. Having grown and eaten Habaneros for years my wife and I both love the flavors and have a great respect the potential for explosive heat of these tiny pods. I chop these up carefully using a knife and fork, keeping my fingers safely away from the fiery oils on the inside of the pepper.
An adventuresome person who decided to pop one of these in his or her mouth and started chewing would, within seconds, feel the insides of their mouths become much like the molten surface of the sun. This is because of the high amounts of the chemical capsaicin contained within Habaneros. Capsaicin is measured in Scoville heat units (SHU). A standard bell pepper rates a 0 (zero) on the Scoville scale. Those Jalapeño peppers you sometimes see in restaurants? They clock in at a mere 2,500 – 8,000 SHU. Habaneros come in between 100,000 and 350,000 SHU.
That’s hot.
And, see those pretty little red peppers growing straight upright on the cover of Schwied’s book? They could be Tabasco peppers (30,000-50,000 SHU) or they could be Thai peppers (50,000-100,000). We’ve grown Thais in the past and they’re as deadly as they are tiny. Personally, I recommend eating a salsa made with both while you read Schweid’s book.
— tom