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Part 6: The hottest chili pepper in the world
 Since 1994 and until 2006 the record holder as the “hottest
pepper” was the Red Savina Habanero with an SHU rating of
577,000. In 2006 two agronomists, Joy and Michael Michaud, in
Dorset, England, bought some chili peppers at a Bangladeshi
market in Bournemouth, took them home and found them extremely
hot. They took some seeds and grew them in their garden and when
they tested the harvested bite-size chilies they recorded an SHU
of 876,000. They sent it to a laboratory in New York where it
recorded even a higher SHU of 970,000. They called it Dorset
nAgA recognizing that it is a variant of Bangladesh’s fiery nAgA
morich. With all the certificates of analysis they applied for
the “hottest pepper” status in the Guinness Book of Records. At
about a million SHU, the Dorset nAgA became the hottest pepper
around. End of story? Not quite!
In August 2000, some Indian scientists from
the Defence Research Laboratory in Tezpur, Assam, reported on a
new chile cultivar which they identified as Capsicum frutescens
cv. Nagahari. It was dubbed Tezpur chili and also referred to as
Indian PC-1. The native name is nAgA jalakiA, “chili of the
Nagas”, after the inhabitants of Nagaland. Its heat index was
855,000 SHU. The results were published in the journal Current
Science, (79, 287, 2000). However, the work invited considerable
criticism for lack of proper calibration of the HPLC apparatus
that was used in measuring the capsaicin content.
 In addition, authentic nAgA jalakiA material
was not available outside of India for others to corroborate the
results. Also it was questioned whether a Capsicum frutescens
variety (to which the Tabasco pepper belongs) could engender
such a high SHU material. However, in 2003, it was suggested
that the Tezpur variant could belong to Capsicum chinense (to
which the Red Savina Habanero belongs) which lent some credence
to the heat claim. The Dorset Naga, which is a variant of the
Bangladesh species, was characterized as C. chinense. It appears
that nAgA jalakiA has the genes from both C.frutescens and C.
chinense. This nAgA jalakiA is commonly grown in northeastern
India (Assam, Nagaland, and Manipur) and Bangladesh.
 NAgA jalakiA is also called variously as Bih
jalakia (“poison chili pepper” in Assamese language) in some
places of Assam, Bhut jalakia (“ghost” — perhaps due to its
ghostly bite or a reference to its introduction from neighboring
Bhutan), Nagahari, Naga morich, and Raja Mirchi (“king of
chilies”). Despite such different names they all refer to the
same chili with the name Naga, a name associated with the
warrior clan of Nagaland. Ripe nAgA chilies measure 6 to 8 cm
long and 2 to 3 cm wide with an orange or red color. While
similar in appearance with the Habanero peppers, the skin of
nAgA peppers is dented.
bih Jolokia in Assam
 The Chile Pepper Institute at New Mexico
State University in Las Cruces, New Mexico, decided to test the
validity of the “world’s hottest pepper” claim from several
entries starting in 2001.
The director of the institute received
seeds from one “bhut jolokia” from someone who collected it
while visiting India.
The institute grew those seeds to get some
bulk seed in order to conduct field trials and compare with
other varieties. After a few years they had enough seeds to
conduct field trials of seeds from bhut jolokia, orange habanero
and red savina.
 After growing all the three under controlled
conditions, the pods were harvested and the SHU of each was
measured by HPLC. The orange habanero measured 357,729 SHU while
the red savina was even less than the orange habanero. The bhut
jolokia crossed the million mark at 1,001,304 SHU. DNA analysis
also indicated that bhut jolokia had genes of C. frutescens and
C. chinense. Correspondingly Assam-based Frontal Agritech had
their Bih jolokia tested at 1.041,427 SHU thereby affording
independent verification of the chile pepper from north-eastern
India/Bangladesh being the “hottest chile pepper in the world”.
 In February 2007, Guinness World Records
certified the Bhut Jolokia (which is the preferred name for the
Indian pepper at the Chile Pepper Institute) as the “world’s
hottest chili pepper”. As noted above, all the varieties, bhut
jolokia, nAgA jolokia, and Raja Mirchi belong to the same class
and originated from north-eastern India/Bangladesh. The Dorset
nAgA that was mentioned at the outset, likewise, is a derivative
of the nAgA Jolokia. So, at this point and until some other
species/cultivar can claim a higher SHU, the Bhut Jolokia/Bih
Jolokia/NAgA Jolokia/Raja Mirchi/Naga Morich clan can hold the
title as the “hottest pepper in the world” When a chemical called substance P is
released from a neuron (nerve cell), pain gets propagated.
Capsaicin reduces the amount of substance P in nerve endings and
interferes with pain signal transmission to the brain. Capsaicin
can be used in a cream or ointment form to relieve neuralgia
(pain in the nerves near the skin), and minimize the pain caused
by diabetic neuropathy, osteo-arthritis, or rheumatoid
arthritis. Capsaicin also relieves the pain caused by shingles
(blisters around one side of the waist caused by the chicken pox
virus) in adults. A Danish study confirmed the pain-relief
effect of capsaicin when applied to the wound area during/after
surgery. However one has to be careful as to not to have contact
with water at the area where the capsaicin cream was applied for
a few hours since the cutaneous pain will increase temporarily.
For a full account of how the hottest chili
pepper issue was resolved visit the following sites.
http://www.fiery-foods.com/dave/sagajolokia.asp
http://www.chileseeds.co.uk/bhut_jolokia_chilli_seed.htm
Part 1 |
Part 2 |
Part 3 |
Part 4 |
Part 5
Sethuraman
Subramanian
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