Epicurious - ‘Pepper X’ Creator Ed Currie Blind Tastes 12 of The World’s Hottest Peppers | Hot Takes | Epicurious
Smokin' Ed Currie, a renowned pepper breeder and hot sauce producer, conducts a blind taste test of 12 different peppers. He evaluates each pepper based on its flavor and heat level, providing insights into their culinary applications. For instance, he describes the Thai Bird pepper as flavorful and mild, ideal for cooking when ripe. The Shishito pepper, often mild but occasionally spicy, varies in heat depending on its growing conditions. Currie highlights the Noah pepper for its intense heat and earthy flavor, cautioning against using it to prank others. The Yellow Bhut Assam is noted for its bitterness and suitability for cooking. The Apollo pepper, one of Currie's favorites, combines fruitiness with extreme heat, while the Carolina Reaper is described as initially sweet but overwhelmingly hot, suitable only for cooking or making hot sauce. Currie concludes with the Caramel Razor, a pepper with brutal heat but limited flavor, best used in hot sauces.
Key Points:
- Smokin' Ed Currie evaluates peppers based on flavor and heat, offering culinary insights.
- Thai Bird pepper is mild and flavorful, best when ripe and roasted.
- Shishito peppers vary in heat; greenhouse-grown ones tend to be hotter.
- Noah pepper is extremely hot with an earthy flavor, not for pranks.
- Carolina Reaper is sweet initially but very hot, suitable for cooking.
Details:
1. 🌶️ Meet Smokin' Ed Currie: Pepper Enthusiast
- Smokin' Ed Currie is renowned in the pepper community for breeding some of the world's hottest peppers, including the Carolina Reaper.
- He is conducting a blind taste test of 12 unique peppers, aiming to evaluate them on both flavor and spiciness.
- The peppers will be rated from more flavorful to less flavorful and from mild to spicy, providing valuable insights into their culinary applications.
2. 🥗 First Taste: The Thai Bird Pepper
2.1. The Thai Bird Pepper Tasting Experience
2.2. Culinary Uses and Cooking Techniques
3. 🔍 Second Pepper: Shishito Surprise
- Shishito peppers typically have no aroma from the outside, indicating mildness but with potential hidden heat.
- The pepper's unique structure includes a seed pocket and placental tissue extending throughout, with no visible oil, suggesting a lack of heat.
- The color inside the pepper can indicate mild heat, but in this case, no heat was detected upon tasting.
- Shishito peppers are known for their unpredictable heat, with approximately one in ten being spicy, influenced by growing conditions such as location and environment.
- Peppers grown in hot houses tend to be spicier than those grown in fields.
- The flavor of Shishito peppers may develop more once they turn red.
4. 🔥 Third Encounter: The Noah Pepper's Heat Challenge
4.1. Characteristics and Effects of the Noah Pepper
4.2. Flavor Profile and Recommendations
5. 🌼 Fourth Flavor: Yellow Bhut Assam
- The Yellow Bhut Assam pepper has a smooth and shiny skin with unique ridges and a floral tone similar to lemongrass when the calyx is removed.
- It contains a high seed pocket with glistening oil, indicating a significant oil content.
- Some seeds are brown and immature, while others are mature and normal in color.
- The aroma is strong due to the oil content, which can be intimidating.
- The flavor includes a lemony yet bitter tone, making it unsuitable for eating raw but excellent for cooking.
- The pepper is spicier, belonging to the Jolokia family, and is used sliced in cooking at home.
6. 🌿 Fifth Pepper Experience: The Apollo
- The Apollo pepper has a unique spiral look with ridges and bumps, creating an appealing visual phenotype that can be consistently reproduced.
- Despite its aesthetic appeal, the Apollo is not as hot as some peppers pursued for world records but still contains significant placental tissue, leading to high capsaicin levels and oil pooling.
- The pepper is described as brutally hot, with fruit, spice, and heat flavors, followed by intense pain and an endorphin rush, leading to physical reactions such as shaking and euphoria.
- Rated among the top three favorite peppers for its flavor, the Apollo offers a unique blend of aesthetics and intense heat experience.
7. 🦠 Sixth Pepper Insight: Pepper X
7.1. Physical Characteristics of Pepper X
7.2. Flavor Profile and Spiciness of Pepper X
8. 🥕 Seventh Sample: Habanada Delight
- The pepper features three distinct ridges and a slight curve, indicative of crossbreeding.
- The pepper has a smooth surface with a glistening interior but lacks significant oil or aroma.
- Its internal structure resembles an orange habanero, while its shape is similar to an orange Ghost Pepper.
- The flavor is described as fruity, almost creamsicle-like, and enjoyable, with no detectable heat.
- Visually, when fully ripe, it resembles a carrot with a dark orange tone, similar to a 'Bugs Bunny carrot'.
- The pepper is identified as a Habanada, offering top-tier flavor without any spiciness.
9. 🌍 Eighth Exploration: Orange Habanero
- The Orange Habanero is visually appealing with earthy, fall tones and a unique five lobe top, indicating a possible relation to the Scotch Bonnet or 7 Pot families.
- Its cut releases oil immediately, confirming it as a super hot pepper, despite its sweet aroma, which suggests culinary uses.
- The sweet aroma makes it ideal for dishes like ceviche, which blends citrus and sweetness.
- Taste-wise, it is extremely sweet with a fruit-forward profile, perfect for jellies or marmalades.
- It has a heat level slightly above Thai chili but with superior flavor, making it a mild yet flavorful option.
10. 🔪 Ninth Discovery: Scotch Bonnet x Reaper
- The Scotch Bonnet x Reaper pepper has a distinct shape with sharp spikes on the skin, indicating it has been crossbred.
- It features a very thick seed pocket and skin, along with a fruity aroma, providing a unique flavor profile.
- This pepper offers a higher heat level than a habanero, making it suitable for those who prefer spicier dishes.
- It is suggested as an alternative with more heat for any recipe that would typically use a habanero.
- The flavor is described as excellent, and it is perceived as having more flavor than the Yellow Ghost Pepper.
- The pepper is available for purchase and can be grown at home, offering accessibility for enthusiasts.
11. 🌶️ Tenth Test: Cayenne x White Ghost
- The Cayenne x White Ghost pepper is noted for its flat, long appearance without unique placental tissue lines, suggesting a flavorful profile.
- The interior features two distinct placental lines, typical of a cayenne, especially from Central America, with a long seed pocket reaching the bottom.
- Touching the pepper to a table reveals two distinct lines of oil, indicating a higher oil content.
- The Cayenne x White Ghost pepper is slightly hotter than the Scotch Bonnet Reaper, causing a nasal reaction and placing it on the mild side of the heat scale.
- Cayennes are noted for breeding well with other peppers, as evidenced by this crossbreed.
12. 🔥 Eleventh Encounter: Carolina Reaper
- The Carolina Reaper is described as having a very distinct appearance with a tail, lobes, and bumps, and is bright and shiny in color.
- The inside of the pepper features a high seed pocket and placental tissue that extrudes oil from the glands, contributing to its intense aroma.
- The speaker expresses a strong reaction to the pepper, with physical symptoms including watering eyes and a burning sensation in the mouth and chest.
- The flavor of the Carolina Reaper is quickly overshadowed by its intense heat, making it unsuitable for eating straight without preparation or cooking.
- Despite its heat, the Carolina Reaper is a source of pride for the speaker, indicating its significance or value to them.
13. 🔪 Final Pepper: Caramel Razor
- The Caramel Razor pepper is characterized by its unique shape with wrinkles and warts, offering a distinct cut angle, and contains high seat pockets with placental tissue extending to the bottom, which aids in oil release.
- Its aroma is rich, with a tannin smell reminiscent of dark chocolate, and the flavor profile includes an allspice taste, making it suitable for various culinary applications.
- The pepper has a brutal heat level, more intense than the Reaper x Scotch Bonnet or Bhut, but less flavorful than a Reaper, making it ideal for cooking and hot sauce production.
- Developed by PuckerButt Pepper Company, the pepper showcases a selective breeding process, emphasizing its unique characteristics and potential for culinary innovation.