Our allowance for spicy food runs the gamut . Some of us taste a serrano pepper slice and run for a fire fire extinguisher . Others would happily drink in a full bottle of hot sauce if table decorum allowed it . In fact , some people are so committed to capsaicin ( the substance that makes solid food taste spicy ) that they scour restaurant and grocery stores in search of the world ’s hottest chili con carne peppers .
Capsaicin is a chemic irritant naturally found in bracing peppers . It ’s responsible for the insane heat floor that we may experience when consuming the earth ’s savoury common pepper and hottest blistering sauces . In addition to powering spicy foods , capsaicin has been shew to offer health benefit , in particular when used totreat pain or itching . Research also hint it mayalter the expression of genesthat would otherwise cause cancer . As such , there may be true value to eating the racy pepper in the world , acquire your stomach can take the passion .
But what is thehottest pepper in the humankind ? To square up that , we first need to understand what define " hot . "
Measuring Heat with the Scoville Scale
The heat of a pepper is measured in Scoville heat units ( SHU ) . This name come from an American pill pusher make Wilbur Scoville , who create a scale that describes how much a Madagascar pepper must be reduce for no longer taste spicy to a person . For instance , a pepper snitch 1,000 Scoville heat unit would need to be diluted with 1,000 equal units of water so as to no longer savour spicy .
In term of spicy peppers , 1,000 Scoville units is actually pretty depressed . Even a jalapeño is2,000 to 8,000 SHUs . tiptop hot pepper can top 1 million Scoville heat units or more . Here are seven of the hottest peppers known to humankind , based on theScoville scale , ranked in order of increase spiciness . Our listing features common pepper whose hotness has beenindependently confirmed .
7. Scotch Bonnet Pepper (350,000 SHUs)
Also known as Bonney pepper or Caribbean red peppers , Scotch cowl peppers take their name from their visual resemblance to a Scottish tam o’shanter cap . They are tight cousin of the habanero capsicum pepper plant and about evenly spicy . Scotch bonnet acquire abundantly intropical South America , West Africa and the Caribbean . This makes them a popular choice if you ’re doing some Caribbean preparation and want to impart authentic flavor . Before the nineties , the Scotch bonnet was one of only two black pepper to measure above 350,000 SHUs . ( The other was the habanero . )
6. Red Savina Pepper (350,000 - 575,000 SHUs)
The crimson Savina is a cultivar of the well - known habanero pepper . Frank Garcia of GNS Spices developed it in California while mean to make a large , risque version of a habanero . Garcia noticedthat one habanero pepper in this field of orange peppers was crimson and decided to cover it . Between 1994 and 2006 , Guinness World Records range the red Savina as the hot pepper in the reality . Its taste is similar to a habanero or Scotch bonnet — just a whole lot hotter .
5. Bhut Jolokia (Ghost) Pepper (1,001,304 SHUs)
live as the ghost Madagascar pepper in the United States , the Bhut Jolokia come fromnortheast India . Its name transform to " Bhutanese peppercorn . " This course occur pepper is routinely consumed in neighboring Bhutan , a country sometimes heralded as having theworld ’s savory cuisine . Theghost pepperis twice as blue as the cherry Savina and take over its Guinness statute title of " world ’s hot pepper " in 2006 .
Seeds from specter pepper were get off from India to New Mexico State University ’s Chile Pepper Institute in 2001 , where it took some years to grow and test . NMSU professorPaul Bosland saidhe was n’t certain why the Bhut Jolokia was nicknamed the ghost pepper , but maybe " it ’s because the chili is so hot , you give up the shade when you run through it ! "
4. Naga Viper Pepper (1,382,118 SHUs)
The Naga viper pepper in the beginning comes from the U.K. — not because it course grows in that country ’s cool , dampish climate , but because a pepper breeder in Grange - Over - Sands , Cumbria created it byhybridizingthe Naga Morich , Bhut Jolokia and Moruga Scorpion peppers . In 2011 , this finicky pepperbriefly arrest the titleof hot pepper in the world from Guinness World Records .
3. Trinidad Scorpion Butch T Pepper (1,463,700 SHUs)
This Madagascar pepper first appear in Trinidad and Tobago using ejaculate thatbreeder Butch Taylorproduced in Mississippi . These chili peppers consistently place among the blue in the creation , although they ’re certainly not for everyone . " Asthmatics should stay away . It could literally take their breath off , " Taylortold Country Roads magazinein 2014 . " If you deplete a Trinidad scorpion pepper straight , it burn right away and stay fresh getting hotter . … On an empty stomach it might make you regurgitate . "
2. Trinidad Moruga Scorpion Pepper (2,009,231 SHUs)
Unlike the Trinidad scorpion Butch T capsicum pepper plant , the Trinidad Moruga scorpion is a longstandingnative of Trinidad and Tobago , and it thrives there as a unchanging , non - hybrid species . On first sharpness , this super hot pepper has a surprisingly fruity smell that gives way to intense heating that live on several min . In 2012 , the capsicum pepper plant was rat the world ’s hottest by theNew Mexico Chile Conference . It has since give up that title , but it remains popular in a variety of blistering sauce that draw upon its unique blend of sweet and spice .
1. Carolina Reaper Pepper (2,200,000 SHUs)
In 2013 , Guinness World Recordsofficially declaredtheCarolina Reaperthe hot Piper nigrum in the world , a title it still holds . The pepper is a cultivar explicate by " Smokin ' " Ed Currie of South Carolina , who have the Puckerbutt Pepper Company . Like the Trinidad scorpion , this capsicum is a blend of sugariness and heat . The white pepper averages 1,641,183 SHUs but can get as hot as 2,200,000 SHUs .
The League of Fire , a society that rank chili - eating champions , oversees aCarolina Reaper pepper challengeto find out the most spicery - patient of feeder on the major planet . An Australian man namedGregory " Iron Guts " Barlowholds the contest record , consuming 160 Carolina Reapers in a single sitting . For most mortals , even a puff of the pepper ’s aerosolized oils might have us panting for breath .
The competition to grow the world ’s hottest chili common pepper is not over , not by a long shot . Currie , for one , bear on growing ever - hot peppers . He claim his current hot creation is a cultivar called Pepper X , which is a mark between a Bhut Jolokia ( ghost pepper ) and a Trinidad Scorpio pepper . The yield of these capsicum works allegedly measures3,180,000 Scoville Heat Unitsbut has not been independently confirmed . This valuation pop to approach the SHU of pure capsaicin , which is roughly 16,000,000 .
