Chilli Seeds

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Chilli Pepper Seeds

We started making sauce from our very first chillies, to try at first hand the quality and character of the fruits we were growing for seed and quickly became as enthusiastic about chilli sauce as we were for the plants. Our chilli sauces and chutney pages feature our wide range of handmade products from the famous (infamous?) Ten Minute Burn sauce (banned from four chilli shows for being too hot!!) to our authentic Heavenly Barbeque chilli sauce and wonderfully warming chilli honeys.

Feel The Heat
The Capsicum Frutescens family of plants spans many varieties including African chillis, Tabasco chillis, Mexican chili chillis, Jalapenos, Bell chillis, Pimentoes, Paprikas, and Bird chillis. All plants in the Capsicum family contain the active chemical (capsaicin), the ingredient that puts the “Hot” in hot chillis. While some Capsicum fruits, such as paprika produce mild heat, others such as Habaneros are extremely hot.

Scoville Heat Units

It was in 1912 whilst working for the Parke Davispharmaceutical company that one of their chemists, Wilbur Scoville,developed a method to measure the heat level of a chilli pepper. This test is named after him, it’s called the Scoville OrganolepticTest, a dilution-taste procedure. In the original test, Scoville blendedpure ground chillies with a sugar-water solution and a panel of testersthen sipped the concoctions, in increasingly diluted concentrations,until they reached the point at which the liquid no longer burned themouth. A number was then assigned to each chilli based on how muchit needed to be diluted before you could taste no heat. Thepungency of chilli peppers is measured in multiples of 100 units, fromthe bell pepper at zero Scoville units to the incendiary Habanero at300,000 Scoville units! One part of chilli “heat” per 1,000,000 drops ofwater rates as only 1.5 Scoville Units.

The substance that makes a chilli so hot (andtherefore so enjoyable to Chilli-Heads !), is Capsaicin. Pure Capsaicin rates over 15,000,000 Scoville Units! Thevalidity and accuracy of the Scoville Organoleptic test havebeen widely criticised. The American Spice TradeAssociation and the International Organisation forStandardisation have adopted a modified version. TheAmerican Society for Testing and Materials is considering otherorganoleptic tests (the Gillett method) and a number of otherchemical tests to assay for capsaicinoids involved in pungency.Even so, the values obtained by these various tests are oftenrelated back to Scoville Units.

As a result of all these tests, various varieties of chilli peppers can be ranked according to their heat or “pungency” level. (See table).

The following is a list of chillies, put into a scale to show the relative pungency levels and their Scoville Heat Units.

Name Pod Type Species Scoville Units

Pure Capsicum – – 16,000,000

Naga Viper Habanero C. Chinense 1,382,118
Bhut Jolokia Habanero C. Chinense 1,001,304
Naga Morich Habanero C. Chinense 800,000 – 900,000
Red Savina Habanero Habanero C. Chinense 580,000
Orange Habanero Habanero C. Chinense 300,000
Red Habanero Habanero C. Chinense 150,000
Tabasco Tabasco C. Frutescens 120,000
Tepin Tepin C. Annuum 75,000
Chiltepin Tepin C. Annuum 70,000
Thai Hot Asian C. Annuum 60,000
Jalapeno M Jalapeno C. Annuum 25,000
Long Slim Cayenne Cayenne C. Annuum 23,000
Mitla Jalapeno C. Annuum 22,000
Santa Fe Grande Hungarian C. Annuum 21,000
Aji Escabeche Aji C. Baccatum 17,000
Long Thick Cayenne Cayenne C. Annuum 8,500
Cayenne Cayenne C. Annuum 8,000
Pasillia Pasillia C. Annuum 5,500
Primavera Jalapeno C. Annuum 5,000
Sandia New Mexican C. Annuum 5,000
NuMex Joe E Parker New Mexican C. Annuum 4,500
Serrano Serrano C. Annuum 4,000
Mulato Ancho C. Annuum 1,000
Bell Bell C. Annuum 0

If during experimentation with hot sauces or recipes using Chilli Oil you find you have misjudged the heat, water and beer will be of little help. Tequila has a high enough ethanol content to help a little more, but by far the greatest relief comes from fatty foods and dairy products. It is no co-incidence so many curries include cream or butter, and that Mexican food is often served with soured cream or guacamole.

Capsaicin, also known as N-Vanillyl-8-methyl-6-(E)-noneamide, is the most pungent of the group of compounds called Capsaicinoids that can be isolated from chilli peppers. It is sparingly soluble in water, but very soluble in fats, oils and alcohol. Here, causing some of the “pain”, is the chemical composition of two of the most common of the Capsaicinoids. Heat scales are purely subjective. Even with a specific test as above, the hotness of a chilli can vary even in the same variety from plant to plant and even on the same plant. Chilli peppers are a lot of fun. But please take them seriously and handle them with care. Most (though not all) of the hot in hot chillis comes from Capsaicin and a closely related compound, dihydrocapsaicin. It occurs in much lower quantities in oregano, cinnamon, and cilantro (corriander).

What makes Chillies Hot?

Capsaicinoids are the name given to the class of compounds found present in members of the capsicum family of plants. The most common of these compounds is Capsaicin, which is found in the white ‘ribs’ inside hot chillies. Capsaicin probably evolved in plants as a protective mechanism, to discourage certain pests. Different species of chilli contain different amounts of capsaicin, conferring different degrees of “hotness”. In 1912 Wilbur Scoville proposed a scale of measurement based on the apparent hotness of extracts placed on the tongue after dilution. Thus, bell chillies have a rating of less than 1 Scoville unit, jalapeno chillies 103 units, Habanero chillies 105 units, and pure capsaicin 107 units.

A scale developed by Wilbur Scoville in 1912, to measure the heat level in chillies. It was first a subjective taste test, but since, it has been refined by the use of HPLC, the unit is named in honour of its inventor.

The test officially measures the pungency level of a given chilli. There are other methods, but the Scoville Scale remains the most widely used and respected. The greater the number of Scoville units, the hotter the chilli. Of course, being a natural product, the heat can vary from chilli to chilli, so this scale is just a guide.

The greater the number of Scoville units, the hotter the chilli product!