Some like it hot and some like it hotter by Robert Kiener

Some Like It Hot and Some Like It Hotter

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Some Like It Hot and Some Like It Hotter . . . as our intrepid reporter Robert Kiener discovered

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Walking through the massive, bustling Abasto Market in Oaxaca City, Mexico, I am overwhelmed by the colourful, pungent mountains of vegetables, fruit, meat, fish, and fowl. As I pick my way over slippery floors and dodge scurrying customers, vendors offer me everything from exotic three-cow's-milk cheeses to the local specialty, chapulines (fried grasshoppers).

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I refuse to let them put me off my quest. I have come to Oaxaca City, one of Mexico's culinary centres, in my search for some of the world's hottest chilli peppers. My guide, noted Mexican cooking expert and cookbook author Susana Trilling, leads me around a corner and we come upon stall after stall of chilli peppers in every conceivable shape, size and colour. They are piled high on wooden crates, spill out of plastic laundry baskets and overflow from brown burlap sacks. ''We have a wider variety of chilli peppers here than almost any other place in the world,'' Trilling declares.

Indeed, chilli pepper fanatics from around the world, also known as ''chilli-heads,'' make pilgrimages to this market to worship at the altar of the humble, but addictive, fruit. Trilling greets a chilli pepper vendor like an old friend and begins pointing out the different varieties: dark brown chipotles, the spherical cascabel, the dried red guajillo, green and red serranos, ten-centimetre-long mirasol, bulletshaped piquins, the jalapeno. At another stall she shows me some habaneros – lantern-shaped, bright orange chillis that look beguilingly beautiful. As I reach for one, Trilling grabs my arm. ''Don't touch that one unless you're wearing gloves,'' she says. ''It's dangerously hot.'' If you don't wear gloves and absentmindedly rub your eyes, it will be very painful, she adds. I ask what would happen if I bit off a small sample. ''It will rip off the top of your head!'' she replies. Her tone and her suddenly stern, deep brown eyes convince me she's not kidding. Despite the warning, I know I won't be able to resist the lure of the Habaneros for long. It is estimated that one in four people eats chillis every day. They are an integral part of diets around the world, from Mexico and the Middle East to Thailand and Korea. Chillis were first domesticated in South America, in what is now Bolivia, some 6000 years ago. Incas called the spicy fruit aji, and the Aztecs changed it to chilli. Thanks to Christopher Columbus, the newly christened chillis spread to Europe in the late 1400s. Portuguese and Spanish traders introduced them to Africa and Asia, where they were such a hit that locals soon viewed the import as their own. Today, because of their sheer popularity and ease of cross-pollination, there are thousands of varieties around the world. Thais eat more hot peppers – five grams per person per day – than anyone else in the world. India produces more chilli peppers – over two million acres worth – than any other country. Hungary's famously pungent condiment, paprika (from the Latin for ''pepper''), is derived from hot sweet red peppers that are grown in Central Europe and in Spain. Chilli peppers have long been a part of folklore around the world. They were used to deter vampires and werewolves in Eastern Europe and thought to ward off the ''evil eye'' by South and Central Americans. In northern Mexico chillis are still used in potions meant to make an enemy ill, and as a cure for hangovers. Everywhere you go, the first rule of chillis seems to be: the hotter the better. Recently, near the ancient Punjab town of Multan, a Pakistani friend told me over a dinner that featured an eye-watering variety of fiery chillis, ''There's no such thing as a chilli that's too hot.'' Just why do chilli-heads crave hotter and hotter chillis? ''The easy answer is that we're crazy,'' says Dave DeWitt http://www.rdasia.com/some_like_it_hot_and_some_like_it_hotter (1 of 4)4/4/2012 3:02:41 PM

Some Like It Hot and Some Like It Hotter

(also known as ''Pope of Peppers''), founding editor of Chili Pepper Magazine and author of a slew of chilli pepperrelated books. But there's a physiological explanation. Your body releases endorphins to counter the pain brought on by a red-hot chilli. ''Those endorphins create a mild euphoria or a mini-high or a pepper-high,'' says DeWitt. The Aztecs labelled chilli peppers on a wonderfully descriptive scale that included ''hot,'' ''brilliant hot'' and ''runaway hot.'' More recently, scientists developed the Scoville scale to do the same job. Mild jalapenos can range up to 5000 Scoville units, while the frighteningly hot habanero (the Mexican chilli Susana Trilling warned me about) can top 300,000 Scovilles. To see first hand how powerful some peppers can be, I travel with Trilling some five hours west of Oaxaca City to Chalcatongo. ''We're going to meet Oaxaca's ‘Queen of the Chillis,' Annalyse Ramirez Martinez,'' Trilling explains as our car climbs higher and higher into the Sierra Madre Mountains. ''She's an expert cook and chilli pepper dishes are her specialty.'' When we arrive in the bustling market town, we buy a bagful of especially pungent chillis, the small, dried red chilli costeno. They will be the main ingredient in a dish, salsa de barbacoa, that Annalyse is making specially for us. Chilli peppers get their kick from a chemical called capsaicin located in the inside wall of the pepper pod. When we arrive at Annalyse's modest wood frame home, Trilling explains how potent capsaicin can be. The Incas burned red peppers to tempora-rily blind invading Spaniards, and the Mayans punished offenders by forcing them to inhale the acrid smoke of burning peppers. These days, police forces fight off bad guys with pepper spray and tear gas made from capsaicin. ''And we roast some chilli peppers to drive the snakes out of our homes,'' adds petite, black-haired Annalyse. Suddenly, the deceptively mild-looking chilli costeno, which had been bubbling on Annalyse's gas range, starts smoking. The small kitchen fills with pungent, acrid smoke. My eyes immediately start watering and I am soon convulsed by fits of coughing. I can bear it for less than a minute before I dash out into the courtyard, drop to my knees and breathe in fresh air. And I didn't even eat one of them, I think as I regain my composure. The story of the chilli is not all pain and tears. Scientists have discovered that a raw pepper has more vitamin C than an orange. This year University of Nottingham researchers published findings that show capsaicin may be able to kill cancerous tumours. Other studies suggest capsaicin reduces cholesterol and pain associated with arthritis, diabetes, and muscle and joint problems. Scientists at Germany's Max Planck Institute claim chilli peppers may prevent the formation of blood clots. Hot peppers can also ease the symptoms of the common cold by breaking up congestion and reducing mucus. ''It seems like there's no end to chilli peppers' versatility,'' says Danise Coon, programme coordinator of New Mexico State University's Chili Pepper Institute. The institute recently hit the headlines when the Guinness Book of World Records confirmed that one of its professors, Paul Bosland, had measured the heat level of the world's hottest chilli pepper using the scientifically developed Scoville Scale. The Bhut Jolokia, with a rating of just over one million, is nearly twice as hot as the former record holder, the Red Savina pepper. My trip to Mexico is nearing its end, and I can put off the inevitable no longer. It's time to sample Mexico's hottest chilli pepper, the habanero. A plastic bag containing a half dozen of them sits on the desk of my Oaxaca City hotel room. Recalling Trilling's advice not to touch them with my bare hands, I gamely pull on disposable plastic gloves. I've learned that water is essentially useless in putting out the fire that hot chillis light in your mouth. Instead, I have some milk and yoghurt nearby; the proteins in milk will help neutralise the capsaicin. Like a surgeon, I carefully cut a tiny sliver of the flesh from one of the four-centimetre-long pods. Then, using a toothpick, I place it on my tongue . . . A bomb instantly goes off in my mouth. My tongue feels like it's on fire. My upper palate feels like it's been hit with a flamethrower. ''HOT!'' I scream. My eyes water, I begin gasping for breath. Beads of perspiration roll down my forehead. I think my head will soon explode. How can a tin slice of chilli pepper pack such a punch? I gulp down the milk and yoghurt but it is several hours before my mouth returns to something resembling normal. I don't remember an endorphin rush. Later that day I decide to reward myself with a bowl of mango ice cream at a stall in the Benito Juarez Market. The five-alarm habanero seems a distant memory. Then, as I raise the spoon to my lips, the stall's owner holds out a small bowl and asks, ''Would you like chilli sauce on that?''

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