/ 23 February 2007

Record for world’s hottest chilli pepper

Paul Bosland recalls taking a bite of a chilli pepper and feeling like he was breathing fire.

He gulped down a soda, thinking, ”That chilli has got to be some kind of record.”

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

The name translates as ghost chilli, Bosland said.

”We’re not sure why they call it that, but I think it’s because the chilli 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 chilli. It is nearly twice as hot as Red Savina, the variety it replaces as the hottest.

By comparison, a New Mexico green chilli contains about 1 500 Scoville units; an average jalapeno measures at about 10 000. — Sapa-AP