Hopefully this won't be too controversial, not looking to get people all riled up or anything. It seems that in the past few years there just seem to be more hotter peppers. Red Savinas were supposedly in the 500 K range then Bhuts at around a million, Butch t's last year, Morugas, now this "Carolina Reaper" supposedly with an upper end of 2 million SHU. So where will it end? I think in my lifetime, maybe sooner than I think, we'll see a 5 million SHU pepper (I'm going to name it the 7 Pot Scorpion Death Pod). Is it possible or even probable? What do you think the maximum heat level will be?
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Max SHU?
- Thread starter Pepperhead
- Start date
SadisticPeppers
Business Member
Apoligies if this doesn't come off terribly coherent, I'm fighting off a migraine right now...
There is a hard upper limit to the Scoville Scale, namely 16 million, which is the purified extracted form, so for any pepper to get close to that, it'd have to have a rather significant percentage of that. For a pepper to have ~5 million, that'd mean about 1/3 of it would be pure capsaicin. Not to say it's impossible, and I'm sure there's people even now considering peppers even hotter than the Carolina Reaper, but I'd think there'd be a tradeoff between other things in the pepper like minerals, sugars, and anything else besides the capsaicin. Before long, there wouldn't be much else in the pepper as far as taste, etc.
There is a hard upper limit to the Scoville Scale, namely 16 million, which is the purified extracted form, so for any pepper to get close to that, it'd have to have a rather significant percentage of that. For a pepper to have ~5 million, that'd mean about 1/3 of it would be pure capsaicin. Not to say it's impossible, and I'm sure there's people even now considering peppers even hotter than the Carolina Reaper, but I'd think there'd be a tradeoff between other things in the pepper like minerals, sugars, and anything else besides the capsaicin. Before long, there wouldn't be much else in the pepper as far as taste, etc.
I remember reading somewhere that taste buds don't distinguish any difference in heat level on anything over 1 million SHU. So really, what's the point in breeding mega-ultra-supremo-booyaka peppers? The heat lever will feel the same, 1.5 mil or 3 mil because our buds are maxed out. The only difference might be the amount and duration of pain your stomach and rectum feel afterwards.
I don't buy that one. I can most certainly tell the difference in heat levels from pod to pod. Granted with ultras like Butch Ts, Red Moruga Scorpions, etc., the lines do start to blur. But I can certainly tell the difference between a 1 mil and >=1.5 mil pepper.
How can you say for certain you were eating a 1mill and a 1.5 mill pepper?
Gotta go by the averages. Do I do a HPLC test on each one? Of course not. I've eaten more bhuts than I can remember. And I can without a doubt tell you that every Butch T (I've eaten 4 straight up without being in food, and 15 consumed in food), the majority of my 7 Pot Jonahs (had a few that were on the same level of a "typical" Bhut), the single Red Moruga Scorpion, the single 7 Pot Primo, and the single Douglah have all burned harder than those Bhuts. I'm sure some of those Bhuts didn't touch a million, but the averages are in my favor that a lot of them did.
And yes I understand that all of those listed don't average 1.5 million, but they indeed hit harder than the lower averaged Bhut.
Edit: I do, however, acknowledge that different peppers have different capsaicinoids and I could be more tolerant to a specific capsaicinoid than another, which could make one appear hotter than another.
I think people are doing it for money and fame. Personally, I'd want this for making sauces. I may not be able to eat a 7 pot Jonah without wishing I was dead, but I can make a Jonah hot sauce that taste absolutely delicious.
I'm not questioning your experience (I have next to none). I just feel the validity of the statement "Difficult to differentiate past 1mill SHU" may hold true. If the average Bhut was in the .5Mill SHU then yes Peppers that were most likely above 1 mill would seem substantially hotter. My only real way to tell at this point is how fast the heat kicks in and how long it lasts.
I'd say it's true for the vast majority. But if you eat supers daily (as a lot of us here do), I feel your tolerance will increase to the point where you can differentiate the heat between peppers on the superhot level.
I don't eat them daily, but I have had my fair share. I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt, that I can tell the difference in heat at over 1 million. I may not be able to tell you that a certain pod is 1.4435 million, but I can say that my ButchT is hotter than my Primo, which is not as hot as my Jonah. And not many people would argue that those pods avg above the 1 million mark.
The main point to upping the heat scale is for weaponization. Ghosts are most commonly grown for military use in pepper spray and "LTL" pepper powder pellets (which look like they'd be worse than pepper spray (dermal vs respiratory impact)
Not that I'd want to experience either mind you - but I imagine it'd be worst to breathe the powder (AND get it in your eyes, ears, skin) than just have the liquid burn dermaly.
Either would be horrific though.
Not that I'd want to experience either mind you - but I imagine it'd be worst to breathe the powder (AND get it in your eyes, ears, skin) than just have the liquid burn dermaly.
Either would be horrific though.
I've seen a lot of videos - I never ever wish to experience that.
Indeed - loads of $$$ in it. I'm betting more in military contracts than selling seeds though.
I expect eventually they won't even grow pods. You'll get leaves a stem and capsaicin oil will just spray out where branches should be...
And I kinda doubt that the average for a lot of these peppers is over a million. Perhaps someone who really knows what they are doing might get that consistency while growing but the actual averages are probably closer to between 800,000 and a million. Okay, now I'll step outta the way of the bricks headed this way...