I was wondering what it means when someone says that a hot souce is 400 or something like that they rate it by a number. What does that mean? Guess I am showing I am not an avid user even though I enjoy different kinds. Thanks
Tarzen6

WOW! that is hot.
Hey Unkown Foodie thank you so much for taking the time to explain that to me, that was very very helpful. My daughter is a hot sauce nut. We went to a hot sauce tasting thing in Madison at the winery once and someone had made Habenaro bread it was very hot, even she thought so but it was good, just need lots of milk to eat that though.
Thank you very much for sharing this info with me, I am going to pass it on to my daughter I know she was wondering the same thing.
Thanks again,
Tarzen6

The chemical that makes peppers hot is capsaicin. It is found in the membrane that the seeds are attached to, as well as the seeds within a pepper. In the early 1900's, a scientist named Scoville invented a way to measure the heat intensity of the capsaicin. It amounted to the number of drops of sugar water it took to put the fire out in your mouth after chewing on a hot pepper. For instance, the Jalapeno pepper is rated at around 10,000 scoville units and the Red Savina Habenaro at around 577,000 scoville units. That's a lot of drops of sugar water! Another way of putting it might be to say how much sugar water it would take to dilute a single drop of capsaicin so that you would not be able to taste the heat .The Red Savina has been thought to be the hottest pepper until recently.
The Dorset Naga pepper, grown in England, recently tested 923,000 scoville units and is now recognized as the worlds hottest pepper! This new pepper is a cross breed of the Naga pepper originally from Bangeladesh.
For most "Normal People", the Jalepeno is about as hot as most folks can stand, however, there are those of us Chili Heads (not normal) that enjoy the endophine rush that the hotter peppers provide! For instance, I enjoy a light sprinkle of Red Savina powder on potato chips and the hotter sauces with cheese and in chili.
Remember, the higher the number, the hotter the heat.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Unknown Foodie,