Re:[CH] O.K., Once and For All, What is the Hottest Pepper?
The Old Bear (oldbear@arctos.com)
Sat, 28 Mar 1998 10:32:14 -0500
In Chile Heads Digest, v.4 #366, Seņor Doug, the Chile Monger wrote:
>Date: Fri, 27 Mar 1998 07:04:07 -0800
>From: supervisor@scudder.sbceo.k12.ca.us (Senor Chile Monger)
>Subject: Re:[CH] O.K., Once and For All, What is the Hottest Pepper?
>
>Andy,
>
>The Guiness Book record is held by a Red Savina Habanero (capsicum
>chinense) grown in Oxnard, California registering 577,000 Scoville Heat
>Units measured using high pressure liquid chromography.
>
>Heat is a subjective thing, though. Capsaicin is made up of seven
>alkaloids that come in varying amounts in different varieties of chiles.
>How a person is wired up determines how one reacts to the different
>alkaloid combinations hence the different perceptions of heat. For me
>Habaneros come on slowly, rolling up from the back of my throat and
>settling around the eustachian tubes, a sensation I find quite pleasant.
>Jalapenos, Serranos (capsicum annum) to me have a peppery, up at the
>front of my mouth heat that disapates quickly. Some people claim the
>Rocoto is the hottest, though is only rates around 50,000 Scovilles
>using HPLC, however its alkaloid profile is quite unique.
>
>Also, if you grow your own, you will know that two peppers from the
>same branch on the same plant can have radically different heat levels;
>climate, growing conditions, soil content all contribute to heat and
>flavor.
>
>Have fun making your own determinations.
Doug:
I think this is why "hotter" is not necessarily "better." My family
and I enjoy "hot" but are much more attuned to the complexities of
flavors which surround the "hot" sensations.
A few months ago I read an article about an "electronic nose" which
had been developed -- like what a microphone is to hearing and a
camera is to sight. Although this might be a step toward
"smellovision" (and, yes, I know, much of what's on TV already stinks),
its real application is in the food and cosmetic flavor and fragrance
industry.
The article explained that the "electronic nose" had chromotographic
sensors for over a thousand common organic and inorganic compounds
to which the human nose was sensitive. The signals generated by each
of these sensors were fed to a computer which mapped the information
to a graphic display consisting of a mosaic of pixels which would
change color and brightness depending upon which compounds were being
detected.
The mosaic was somewhat analogous to the taste and olfactory system,
with, for example, certain compounds stimulating the "back of the
tongue" or the upper nose or lingering on the palate.
This device produced a unique and identifiable visual signature for
virtually all recognizable smells.
Interestingly, the while the system would let a skilled operator
recognize patterns which were unpleasant versus pleasant, it did not
easily allow one to "design" fragrances -- i.e., create a visual
"painting" and then translate it into a predicatable designer scent.
The practical application of this device is in production lines for
products like liquid soaps and household products where it can
quickly recognize a departure from the correct scent formulation and
alert the operator to correct the problem.
Returning to the topic of this list -- chile peppers -- this device
raises the question about what the overall flavors of different chile
varieties "look like" and how one might go about providing some
standardized parameters which are more meaningful than just Scoville
units.
The wine industry has its tasting wheel which, while subjective, does
a lot in helping wine lovers communicate specific taste parameters
to one another. My sense is that chile lovers have as much
appreciation for the subtleties of chiles as oenologists have for the
subtleties of a fine Bordeaux, but are currently communicating
as if the only measure of the wine were its percentage alcohol content.
Cheers,
The Old Bear