Mo' Hotta

Sufferin' Scoville! A New Mexico State University professor has grown the worlds hottest pepper clocking in at over one million Scoville Units. The El Paso Times has the story:

NMSU prof finds hottest chile pepper on record
Paul Bosland recalls taking a bite of a chili pepper and feeling as if he were breathing fire. He gulped down a soda, thinking, "That chile has got to be some kind of record."

The Guinness Book of Records agreed, confirming recently that Bosland, a regents professor at New Mexico State University, had discovered the world's hottest chile pepper, Bhut Jolokia, a naturally occurring hybrid native to the Assam region of northeastern India.

The name translates as ghost chile, Bosland said.

"We're not sure why they call it that, but I think it's because the chile is so hot, you give up the ghost when you eat it," he said.

Bhut Jolokia comes in at 1,001,304 Scoville heat units, a measure of hotness for a chile. It's nearly twice as hot as Red Savina, the variety it replaces as the hottest.

By comparison, a New Mexico green chile contains about 1,500 Scoville units; an average jalape�o measures about 10,000.

The Bhut Jolokia variety has potential as a food additive in the packaged food industry, Bosland said. It could be pickled while green, dehydrated and used as seasoning. Because the heat is so concentrated, food manufacturers would save money because they'd use less.

"This isn't something you'd pickle whole and eat, but it could replace dehydrated jalape�o as an additive," Bosland said.

A member of NMSU's Chile Pepper Institute who was visiting India sent Bhut Jolokia seeds to NMSU for testing in 2001. The plant doesn't produce fruit easily, so it took a couple of years to get enough for field testing, Bosland said.

He then grew Bhut Jolokia, Red Savina and haba�ero peppers under controlled settings and found that Bhut Jolokia had significantly higher Scoville ratings. Those findings were confirmed by two independent laboratories.

Bhut Jolokia seeds are available through the Chile Pepper Institute.

Ghost Pepper indeed. Don't know about food additive though as you get get pure Capsicum and it clocks in at at 16,000,000 Scoville Units.