Satan Strain is hotter ???

AJ Drew

AJ Drew

Have now read many sources that claim the Satan Strain of the Moruga Scorpion is hotter than the traditional Moruga Scorpion.  But then some of the same sources cite SHU well below what has been established for the traditional Moruga Scorpion.

All I can figure is maybe perceived heat is not always in line with the SHU.  Maybe it is like a mixed drink with the same alcohol as a shot can hit you harder because the sugar somehow amplifies the alcohol effect.  That or one person said something and a bunch of people repeated it without growing and tasting it themselves.

Thoughts???
 
Percieved heat does, indeed, fail to match up properly. Browns routinely taste hotter than they rate, for example, and so do Fatalii, whereas the Red Savina tends to fall short of the values claimed, be that perception or pod variance, and seems only marginally above other Habs.
Then there's the InfiNaga, which is such a slow burn it tastes as mild as a Jalapeño in the mouth, in my experience, but continues to grow in warmth all the way down and definitely feels like a super in the stomach.
 
The amount of capsaicin in a pod does not directly correlate to the perceived peak heat, which makes current HPLC testing arguably inconsistent with the original, more subjective SHU tests. I like the objectivity but, if it doesn't line up with the actual experience, is it really a useful measurement?
 
I can't say much about this "Satan Strain", though.
 
My experience is that the Satan Strain is an inferior version of the TSM. I didn't find it to be any hotter, actually it seemed to have a little less heat, and the shape of the pods were variable and none had that classic TSM shape.
 
Spicefreak, I really like your posts and comments.  Perceived heat leads us in so many different directions.  Since lots of our peppers and their dishes are cultural, I am willing to bet there might be a human genetic thing going on too.  A bit ago, the FBI published a study that suggests prisons do not use pepper spray on Hispanic prisoners.  Instead, they thought chemical or old fashion mace would work better.  They were unsure if it was due to cultural diet or genetics.  Folk went nuts. 
 
Hope we can have that conversation about taste and perceived heat related to culture and dna without folk going nuts.  Heck, I pulled off peppers and mental illness without people going nuts.  This should be a walk in the park.

So what do you think?  A person raised in the Caribbean and a person raised in the UK both eat something with Scotch Bonnets in it.  Is it likely to taste different to them?  I think so.
 
But what about an englishman raised in the caribbean? You're talking about DNA and cultural upbringing so you need a good way to seperate the two as, otherwise, either one could be the culprit.
 
While there is definitely a general, overall element to heat tolerance, the fact that there are clear types and positions of burn would definitely suggest that it is possible to build more of a tolerance to one than another.
With my introduction to supers being what it was, my main resilience is likely to Scorpions, Nagas and, given my childhood, cinnamon. And indeed, while I seem to be in the majority in finding the intense mouth burn of my local chilli shop's Reaper sauce their hottest natural one, there are definitely those less used to a throat burn than me who struggle noticeably more with the Scorpion sauce below it.
 
Different people definitely react to different heat forms differently.
 
And then there's Hot-Headz's "Man the Fk Up!", which I think I may have had an underwhelming batch of when I had it on video. It's a puree that was originally supposedly nothing but Reaper and salt but its maker swore blind that the second, Scorpion and Reaper batch was hotter.
 
Numerically, there is absolutely no way a blend of 2 peppers could be hotter than one but they do both hit different places, potentially lighting up more of the mouth. There is, at least in terms of perception, some merit to his claim.
 
And then god knows what goes on with browns. They do feel hotter than other colours of the same varieties and I have heard it said that this is because they produce more dihydrocapsaicin but I can see no reason why that would be consistent across every strain that has both brown/chocolate and non-brown forms. I would be far more inclined to believe that something in the brown colour affects perception but that seems like quite the claim as well.
 
I've heard suggestion that the browns contain terpines, loosely related to the active ingredients of cannabis and the wormwood in absinthe but that would technically, if as percievable as that suggests, make all brown peppers (and related vegetables like tomatoes) a mild psycho-active drug. Which seems insane.
 
I don't know the full details of what contributes to perception but I would certainly be interested to find out. I'm currently about to start some self experimentation with crystal menth (pure mint extract) to see how non-thermal hot and cold interact. I've heard that strong chewing gum can be pretty unbearable after super sauce so, if the same works in reverse, I may have something crazy up my sleeve in future.
 
The move with the browns would be to actually do a real blind taste test... Actual blind folded, see how it goes. Personally, i'd recognize the brown flavor, regardless of actual or perceived heat. I'm on of those ppl who really don't dig the chocolates/browns. I tried.

In regards to the question in the OP, with these chiles, the variability in Scovilles from pod to pod make these conversations seem pointless, even though they are interesting to me, personally. Who is to say? How many would you have to eat, back to back, before your experiences became statistically valid? Hell, there's only one of you. Your personal comparisons between 2 varieties will never be statistically valid. Just form your opinions, grow what you like or, if you're in business, grow what sells well...
 
AJ Drew said:
 
So what do you think?  A person raised in the Caribbean and a person raised in the UK both eat something with Scotch Bonnets in it.  Is it likely to taste different to them?  I think so.
Click to expand...
 
Genetics play a role in everything so I could see how certain groups of people are more likely to enjoy eating hot peppers.
 
I have a feeling that it's more of a genetic predisposition/tendency to handle more pain or develop a down regulation of specific pain receptor pathways than it is a lower density of TrpV1 proteins or a different version of that protein. The brain can do surprising things to block out over-stimulated responses.
 
If people in the Caribbean are born with a higher tolerance to spicy food, they would need to be born with a higher tolerance to drinking scalding water - seems unlikely to me.
 
It seems more likely to me that kids in the Caribbean grew up eating spicy foods, whereas kids in the States grow up eating McNuggets and PB&J sandwiches. A greater tolerance builds up over tim, due to cultural differences and the resultant experiences... 
 
I don't know how true it really is, but some pepper tasters on YT distinguish between heat and pain.  A pepper that seems to be higher on the pain level will naturally tend to be regarded as a more extreme pepper, and thus "hotter."  MadBallz 7 has a reputation for being just a pain to eat.  I don't know the chemical complexity involved, but there are probably components in certain peppers that add to their experience without adding capsaicin content.
 
I've had no experience with a MadBallz, but a 7 Pot Barrackpore lights you up immediately, and thus seems to also be, possibly, hotter than it measures.  It seems to be the hottest pepper I've eaten, perhaps because it is all heat out of the gate?
 
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