Oh, my! Not me, not at all. I'm different from other people -- pain hurts me! I don't do hot stuff, but I've agreed to grow some jalapenos for Mr. Marion in Savannah next year. Now, there's love...

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Salt! I put salt on my tongue to put out the fire of chiles! It always works for me. Friends of mine swear by milk, though.

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atomic wings (actually I got the 4-piece boneless strips) smothered in sauce at wingstop. the sauce is made from habanero peppers, with the seeds, simmered in tomato sauce for hours (not a really great tasting sauce, but I ate them on a dare/on principle). I LOVED it. it was an "experience" and one I would like to repeat. I was in pain, but it was quite a rush. I need to try one of those ghost peppers.

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There's a local company (Cajohns fiery foods) that makes a hot sauce that's most habaneros but also contains some powder from this pepper. It's the hottest thing I ever eaten. That pepper is brutal, but used in moderation it adds a very interesting kick to things since it sneaks up an nails you after a few bites.

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At my local Ethiopian restaurant, we once ordered something called Gored Gored, which is raw or BARELY seared bits of beef in a mind-numbingly hot sauce. It was delicious, but killed me on the inside a little bit.

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In 8th grade we went on a class field trip to Washington DC. While we were there, some of the guys bought some novelty hot sauce that isn't really meant for consumption since it's pretty much pure capsicin extract. Well, being 8th grade boys we all had to prove we were more man than each other and each took turns dipping a finger in and on the count of 3, everyone stuck their chili-covered finger in their mouth. My mouth tasted like burning for about 30 minutes. One of the guys started tearing up and made the mistake of wiping his eyes with the chili-fingered-hand. His eye swelled shut for awhile and we all got yelled out by the teacher.

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I've had my share of Vietnamese and Thai peppers, and a few other variations (African Piquin, O'odham Indian Piquin). I sometimes do not feel them when they are green or red. However, I fear them when they are of the orange colour. The last time I ate with my food, I could feel the skin on my cheeks shake. It felt numb for at least 5 mins.

I find jalapenos and habeneros to be not that bad. There is this pepper I always thought were called lantern peppers (orangy and kind of looks like little figs) that I find quite hot. However, they don't smell or taste as good as the piquin family of peppers.

To take out the fire, I spit it out if I cannot handle it. Swallowing is the worse thing that can happen as it will burn the esophagus all the way down. Unpleasant. Then I will drink or rinse my mouth with milk and spit it out. Repeat as often as necessary.

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In Des Moines, where I went to college, there's a little barbecue restaurant which runs a contest annually called the $25,000 Sandwich. If you can choke down a 16-oz beef sandwich made with the owner's hottest sauce, and then keep it down for an hour, you get 25 grand. Simple, right? Hell no. Just to sign up, you need to sample the sauce used.

Being an idiot, I did so; he swished the tip of a toothpick in a little jar the size of a lip balm container. It was at the level of my hip and I could smell it from there. He handed me the toothpick, one end of it jet black and glistening; I popped it into my mouth, sucked it clean, inhaled to say "that's not so bad" and promptly started weeping. My mouth was on fire for the rest of the day, to the point where I sat in my dorm room eating bread and peanut butter.

As I was walking away from this devil of a man, some woman tried the sauce and screamed "how can you do this to people?"

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To relieve the heat, I put some sugar in my mouth and let it sit on the burning spots (or use enough to cover the whole mouth, if needed). It takes a few seconds, but once it sets in, it works wonderfully. It took forever to convince me this would work, but one day I was desperate, but I sure my mouth was going to literally start flaming, so I tried. Sure enough, it worked. I'm told the sugar counter-acts the spicy (like acid and alkaline??). This is the same reason milk works - the lactose in it is sugar. Although, I have learned to never drink anything when my mouth is on fire - the liquid distributes the oils (and whatever else) around your mouth and down the esophogus, thus making it worse.

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Just FYI. I used to be a professional cook at a Southwestern joint, and when someone sends something back asking for it to be more hot, the cooks attitude is usually something like this: "Oh. They want it MORE hot? Well I'll show them!!" Knowing that, if I want more spice to something at a restaurant, I usually ask for my own bottle of hot sauce.

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oh yeah and I was told that tomatoes are the ultimate cure. has anyone else ever heard this? it seems weird considering tomatoes are usually the main ingredient in most salsas.

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Dave's Insanity Sauce - Since the is an extract it is, of course, reeeeallly hot. It was given to me by a relative. I got some on my finger and as a habit popped it into my mouth. Mistake. I love Dave's other sauces, especially the green jalapeno.

Habanero peanut brittle - A piece got stuck in my mouth and released capsacin onto my tongue all afternoon.

Thai peppers from my own garden.

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Joe- I blew my taste buds to nirvana yesterday. I went to the local farm stand and bought red jalapenos, and two types of habaneros. I ate one of each plain to see what the taste and heat level were like.

Then last night I made three batches of hot sauce last night. each hotter than the next. One with the red, ripe jalapenos, the next with pale orange habaneros, and the last with green habaneros. They first two have peaches, Key lime juice, vinegar, salt, garlic, and onion in them. The last is the same but without peaches, but with fresh ginger. I have to age them a bit so the flavors develop and soon I will have some seriously tasty, tongue blasting sauce for you to try.

I can't wait until the jalapenos, Thai peppers, and habaneros in my garden are ready.

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I come from a place known as Muleshoe, Texas. That's one of those places where ordinary peppers grow hot and hot peppers grow atomic nuclei bursting with gamma ray energy and solar center heat. It's something ni the soil and water, I'm told.

Two short anecdotes:

A woman I knew in Chicago was married to a Puerto Rican man who liked his "chili macho" really hot. I asked her if I might taste the hext batch.

She instantly launched into the lecture titled, "You can't take it and I don't care where you are from." My girlfriend of that time told her how many Italian peppers {read: slightly sour pickled pepperoncinis. And they are Greek at that.) The woman was still unimpressed.

I grinned my most charming Texas good-old-boy grin and asked her to put her money where her mouth was. From the look on my face she could tell she had been had. I invited her to bring her husband becase I was interested in meeting him.

Two days later, we met at a beautiful, family-run, Mexican restaurant on East Randolph. We had introductions all around and told the patriarch of the Mexican clan what the challenge was. He said, "Mebbe you too macho for the chili macho but you can't judge a horse by its ass alone." Everybody laughed and I added, "Ok, let's open the horse so I can count its teeth."

The chips came out and Mrs. Puerto Rican brought out the chili macho. I loved her salsa on the first sniff! What a bouquet! She uncovered it and it looked like a work of art. I said that it was really bad that she was already married! More good natured laughter ensued.

I finally, Finally, FINALLY got my first taste of her chili macho and knew I was hooked. She and her husband kept watching me closely. The Mexican family watched me very closely. My girlfriend told me to say something. I swallowed and immediately said, "You should bottle this stuff for public sale. I've never tasted chili macho this good before!"

I wouldn't take her money on the bet but told her I would take a batch of her chili macho instead. Her husband and a somewhat bad reputation but he and I hit it off from the start. I lost track of them about thirty years ago. One or both of us moved to a different town and that was that.

Other anecdote:

Wife and I had business to tend to in Lubbock, Texas. Lubbock is an hour's drive up highway 84 from Muleshoe. Guess wherre their produce comes from shen it's in season? That's right, Muleshoe!

There were some very large, very sexy-looking jalapenos on the bar. I grabbed one and droppet atop my salad. Wife said, "You gonna eat that whole thing?"

She knows how I play when food is involved so I just picked up the jalapeno, stuck it in my mouth up to the stem and bit down. The stem came out and the whole pepper was in my mouth. Chomp, chomp, chomp the pepper went. Gulp, gulp, gulp went my swallower.

I just grinned at her and went back to the salad bar and returned with two more. I told her I loved the taste of the peppers and not to worry about them being to hot for me to eat. I had some salad with ranch dressing and popped the second jalapeno. You have to realize that is was actually a feat of stretching to get those massive peppers into my rather small mouth but I got the job done.

Ate the third pepper. nibbled on salad while I fixed my baked potato up. Took a sip of beer and something really odd happened.

I felt weak in the knees, my throat felt funy and my tongue swelled up! Wife wanted to get me an ambulance on the spot. I gave her a stern look and shook my head, "No." The waitress said, "Honey he's from Muleshoe. Give him a few seconds and he'll recover from his own stupidity in his own time."

I did recover fully. I actually had two more of those utterly delicious jalapenos but not in a masochistic flight of macho stupidity. :)

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SUGAR!! Just pure sugar upon the tongue will ease the burn!

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I love hot food! My favorite way to quench the heat is with beer. Probably doesn't do much to the heat directly but at least it numbs my senses a little.

Check out my hot recipes at reciperate.com

http://www.reciperate.com

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Somehow, I discovered that Refried Beans do a great job of quenching the fire from habanero hot sauce. As soon as I got to the point and not being able to take it, a mouthful of salty refried beans took the heat away almost completely. Strange but true...

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Two *very* hot experiences I will never forget: red calabrese pepperoncini marmalade, sweet, and tangy, and full of flavor, and searingly, blazingly hot; hungarian pickled white peppers, the size of an apple, served as an appetizer in a small restaurant in Eger. White as in "white hot". I couldn't stop crying and sniffing, but couldn't stop gulping them either (with some help from an adjacent ice-cold pitcher of beer)!

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I am growing ghost peppers and can't wait till they mature.

My best pepper plant I grew was a Thai Dragon Pepper.

It had over 1,000 peppers after it's third bloom. Pepper
plants can gro for years.

My Story:

Went to a local bar in seattle. Brought some Thai Dragon peppers with me. Gave one to some Mexican cooks sitting at a table next to me. I said "No Coma" or don't eat this. He laughed and ate the pepper. In seconds his face was puring in sweat and his eyes were popping out of his head.
He stood up and ran to the bathroom. He came out of the
bathroom wiping his tounge with a papper towel, tokk a swing at me ( missed me ) and then ran out the door full
speed.

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I recently tasted of a ghost pepper and thought it
was excellent. Problem is that I cannot locate a
source to buy either the seeds or the plants. Those
Thai peppers sound interesting too. Can anyone help
me find suppliers of such peppers?
Chuck

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