Sampled that Death Spiral pepper today...and I'm still alive!

[pepperhead212]

I finally sampled those Death Spirals today. The kid that I tutored in math a couple of years ago, that I got hooked on growing - mostly peppers, but tomatoes, too - is growing a plant that got HUGE, and he hasn't even given it any food, just water! Larger than mine, but not as early, or as productive, but there's time! Here's a photo of him standing behind it - a small Thai plant is on the left, but most of this is Death Spiral!
A friend growing a Death Spiral I gave him, that got huge! He is 5 foot 10, to give a reference. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Here's the first harvested one, a week ago, so it was getting hotter!
Death Spiral, starting to ripen. 7-27 by pepperhead212, on Flickr

We sampled the first one of mine (he wouldn't wait longer for his, like we were planning on), and I had a half, and he had maybe a quarter of it. But he touched his tongue to it, just to see, and freaked out, saying there was no way he was eating that! His sis (who was making a video of this) made some comments, trying to shame him into trying it, but he wouldn't give. Mind you, this is the kid who wanted me to start reaper seeds for him last year, and he actually tried the chocolate reaper with me! And uses the chocolate and gold bullet habaneros in cooking. So his Mom had to see how it could be that hot, and barely touched it to her tongue, and immediately freaked out, and said that it was the hottest thing she ever had in her mouth, looking for something to cool it off, settling on some ice cream! Meanwhile, her daughter and I were cracking up, and she was telling me not to try it, as she didn't want to have to take me to the hospital! Mind you, this lady is full blooded Indian - not born there, but visited a number of times, to see relatives, and she said there were some things she tried there, and couldn't believe people were eating them, they were so hot.

Turns out, it wasn't as hot as the Red Carolina Reaper, that I grew a few years ago. When I chewed my half, it was incredibly hot, but I kept chewing it for 37.8 seconds (the son was timing me!). This was about the same as the chocolate reaper last year, and trinidad scorpions and bhut jolokias previously. The time I sampled the red reaper I could only make it to 18 seconds. Unscientific, but I definitely knew this was not as hot.

 

[taxlady]

When you eat a pepper like that or cook with it, can you taste anything other than heat?

 

[Chief Longwind Of The North]

From experience, once you are accustomed to eating ridiculously hot peppers, you find lots of flavor. My raging Bull Salsa uses ghost pepper, 7 pod Duglah, Trinidad Scorpion Maruga, and Carolina Reaper powders in it, along with Japones, scotch bonnets, and milder peppers, each adding flavor complexity to the salsa. The people who bought it from me stated that it was the best tasting super=hot salsa they'd ever had. Made my head swell. The point is that this salsa, though hot, is very flavorful, and yes, you can taste everything in it.

I used to keep a jar in the fridge, at work. If I found myself nodding out at the computer, I'd have a tsp. of my salsa. It woke me right ip.

Pepperhead12, that is a beautiful plant, and great looking pepper.

Seeeeya; Chief Longwind of the North

 

[pepperhead212]

taxlady, Actually, I only grow the superhots out of curiosity. I don't cook with them, as I wouldn't be able to use enough of them to taste! I give the rest to a friend, who makes sauces with them, like chief describes. The flavor is actually like a habanero, but not as much of the flavor - those chocolate and gold bullet habaneros I grow, which are about 1/4 to 1/3 as hot (300k to 400k), have some of the best habanero flavor of all the ones I've grown, and those I use a lot.