The Scoville Heat Scale

[The South Falls]

There was a Youtube channel that asked celebrities questions while eating 10 progressively hotter chicken wings, it was relatively amusing to watch as the questions became less answered as the celebrities increasingly struggled to contain themselves.

I quite liked the format idea.

What’s the channel? Sounds highly entertaining.

Why is pain so entertaining? I like it too, but why is it so entertaning? It's why we make people eat peppers for fun, to where they almost die. Shock Jocks even make money off of this...

[Kanussiya]

I think the hottest thing I ever ate was a fresh, raw pepper I had in a salad. I had ordered the salad with Jalapenos, but I can assure you that this was not a Jalapeno. Probably the hottest thing I ate before that would have been a seasoning added to chicken at East Coast Wings, which was about 70,000 Scoville if the waitress was telling the truth. From that comparison, I am pretty sure whatever pepper was in that salad was at least a good 200,000 Scovilles.

That was several years ago when I ate it, and since then, I think my tongue (and large intestine) is more experienced with heat, considering I practically have Sriracha as a drink every time I eat rice and have a spicy component with almost every meal I eat.

[New Emeline]

What’s the channel? Sounds highly entertaining.

Why is pain so entertaining? I like it too, but why is it so entertaning? It's why we make people eat peppers for fun, to where they almost die. Shock Jocks even make money off of this...

Maybe it’s some kind of shock response? Like laughing when you’re nervous.

[The South Falls]

Why is pain so entertaining? I like it too, but why is it so entertaning? It's why we make people eat peppers for fun, to where they almost die. Shock Jocks even make money off of this...

Maybe it’s some kind of shock response? Like laughing when you’re nervous.

It could be. Or maybe, we just all are against each other, and love watching our 'enemies' get hurt, and we can get mates from them, I guess?

[Bombadil]

What’s the channel? Sounds highly entertaining.

Why is pain so entertaining? I like it too, but why is it so entertaning? It's why we make people eat peppers for fun, to where they almost die. Shock Jocks even make money off of this...

I don't think there's a conclusive answer to this, I think it's a particularly human thing. Maybe it's socially engineered, we laugh when babies and children do relatively odd or stupid things so the idea of clumsiness or stupidity become amusing.

I mean.. funny bone.. it's about the least funny bone in the body, not a patch on the humerus.

[Nouveau Yathrib]

I actually read the article you're referencing, I think. I like spicy stuff, but the people that just down whole peppers must be some kind of sadists.

I sometimes do that with jalapeños for an all-natural endorphin high. I also occasionally cook with habaneros but would never eat one raw.

[Farnhamia]

Padrón peppers are fun, usually mild but maybe one in five or six is quite hot. You sizzle them up in some oilve oil. It's like playing Russian roulette with peppers.

[Treadwellia]

I think the hottest thing I ever ate was a fresh, raw pepper I had in a salad. I had ordered the salad with Jalapenos, but I can assure you that this was not a Jalapeno. Probably the hottest thing I ate before that would have been a seasoning added to chicken at East Coast Wings, which was about 70,000 Scoville if the waitress was telling the truth. From that comparison, I am pretty sure whatever pepper was in that salad was at least a good 200,000 Scovilles.

That was several years ago when I ate it, and since then, I think my tongue (and large intestine) is more experienced with heat, considering I practically have Sriracha as a drink every time I eat rice and have a spicy component with almost every meal I eat.

The owner of a former Thai restaurant in town used to have a very specific 1-10 scale of heat that he had for cooking. Sriracha, he said, was around a 5. I routinely munched happily through Spicy #10 fried rice, something he joked about needing a gas mask to make for me.

[Garden at 6th Mile Road]

Spicy chicken briyanis are my favorite thing, and I always help myself with a bottle of Tabasco for pizza.

[Bombadil]

Padrón peppers are fun, usually mild but maybe one in five or six is quite hot. You sizzle them up in some oilve oil. It's like playing Russian roulette with peppers.

Yeah they do similar here but fried in a light form of batter.. better than chips.

What I do tend to add to a lot of meals, especially with pasta, is Chiu Chow Chilli Oil.

[Farnhamia]

Padrón peppers are fun, usually mild but maybe one in five or six is quite hot. You sizzle them up in some oilve oil. It's like playing Russian roulette with peppers.

Yeah they do similar here but fried in a light form of batter.. better than chips.

What I do tend to add to a lot of meals, especially with pasta, is Chiu Chow Chilli Oil.

In small doses? I frequently add crushed red peppers to Italian pasta sauce.

[Dagnia]

For a while I grew my own Habaneros. Just a few plants produced enough to get me through the year. When cooking for other people I rarely used more than maybe a quarter of one for the whole dish, but I could use a whole for myself. Aside from the heat, they have an interesting flavor of their own. When I have a place where I can grow things again, I'd like to start growing Hungarian hot peppers, which are somewhere between Jalapenos and Habaneros.

[Bombadil]

Yeah they do similar here but fried in a light form of batter.. better than chips.

What I do tend to add to a lot of meals, especially with pasta, is Chiu Chow Chilli Oil.

In small doses? I frequently add crushed red peppers to Italian pasta sauce.

Generally a teaspoon into the oil, that is I'm not adding it to the dish per se, just the oil I'm cooking it in.

[Mushet]

I never liked spicy food, I would only partake to see how much I could take. Spiciness is too distracting, but to each their own. I think it's neat they got all these really spicy peppers for the spicehounds.

[Farnhamia]

For a while I grew my own Habaneros. Just a few plants produced enough to get me through the year. When cooking for other people I rarely used more than maybe a quarter of one for the whole dish, but I could use a whole for myself. Aside from the heat, they have an interesting flavor of their own. When I have a place where I can grow things again, I'd like to start growing Hungarian hot peppers, which are somewhere between Jalapenos and Habaneros.

I've had success with serranos and jalapeños. I always put four or five match heads in the hole, I read in a reasonably reputable gardening book that the sulfur in the matches helps. Don't know about that but the plants do well. They keep flowering and fruiting until winter kills them, silly things.

[Bombadil]

For a while I grew my own Habaneros. Just a few plants produced enough to get me through the year. When cooking for other people I rarely used more than maybe a quarter of one for the whole dish, but I could use a whole for myself. Aside from the heat, they have an interesting flavor of their own. When I have a place where I can grow things again, I'd like to start growing Hungarian hot peppers, which are somewhere between Jalapenos and Habaneros.

I've had success with serranos and jalapeños. I always put four or five match heads in the hole, I read in a reasonably reputable gardening book that the sulfur in the matches helps. Don't know about that but the plants do well. They keep flowering and fruiting until winter kills them, silly things.

Plants and fish - things guaranteed to die if I'm taking care of them.

"Not exactly 'taking care' of them there Bob"

[USS Monitor]

A pinch of red pepper powder can add a nice zing to some dishes, and buffalo wings are OK. Anything hotter than that is too hot.

[North Curbstompia]

Carolina reaper jerky is pretty good.
Hell, the guy who made the reaper and pepper x has his shop right in my hometown.

[The Derpy Democratic Republic Of Herp]

I don't like spice all that much. Sometimes it's ok but most of the time I avoid it.

[Bombadil]

I don't like spice all that much. Sometimes it's ok but most of the time I avoid it.

I imagine there'll be some study correlating tolerance for spice with political views coming along shortly.

EDIT: oh it's coming.. link

A fondness for the burn of spicy food has less to do with tolerance and far more to do with personality, according to a new study.

Researchers from Pennsylvania State University have found a love of chili is associated with sensation seeking and reward, but found no evidence that chili lovers get desensitized to chili burn over time.

"Rather than merely showing reduced response to the irritating qualities of capsaicin (the compound that gives chili its burn) as might be expected—these findings support the hypothesis that personality differences may drive differences in spicy food liking and intake," the authors wrote in the journal Food Quality and Preference.

[The Derpy Democratic Republic Of Herp]

I don't like spice all that much. Sometimes it's ok but most of the time I avoid it.

I imagine there'll be some study correlating tolerance for spice with political views coming along shortly.

Oh, for tolerance? I can handle Peter's Denial at burger priest or some Franks Red Hot.

[The Corparation]

I'll have something mildly spicy every now and then but nothing extreme.I don't like hot stuff all that much, I can appreicate some of the flavor but I don't think its worth the pain. My friend on the other hand, loves Carolina Reapers (although he will admit they make his extremities go numb), and is sad that he hasn't been able to get a hold of a Dragon's Breath or Pepper X. He's had food that hot before though as there are restaurants out there season food with what I can only assume is pure Capsaicin I wasn't there but he was at burger joint once that forced him to sign a waiver before he ordered their spiciest burger (Claimed strength equivalent was well above that of pepper spray). He thought they were just being cute about it. They weren't.

[Albrenia]

I imagine there'll be some study correlating tolerance for spice with political views coming along shortly.

Oh, for tolerance? I can handle Peter's Denial at burger priest or some Franks Red Hot.

There's a place called Burger Priest?

I need to go there one day.

[Lady Scylla]

I love spicy food, and fix a lot of things with jalapenos, habaneros, and chili peppers. Never had anything hotter, however. I'm more of a taste person (as in, I like being able to taste my food), so seeking out things like ghost peppers is a no-go.

[Major-Tom]

Spicy food is my life. I'll put hot sauce or sriracha on way too many dishes. Jalapenos, habaneros, even better.