The World's Spiciest Food

As we've established, I usually travel with a small bottle of hot sauce.  When applied liberally, it can save any meal (even boiled cabbage in Siberia, although you might need more than one bottle).   Fortunately, there are some destinations where carrying my hot sauce is completely unnecessary.   These are the places where the Mighty Chilli roams free, and pity the fool traveller who shows it disrespect.

Thailand
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​​The Thai’s don’t cook.  They paint a masterpiece on your palate, with colours of sweet, salty, sour and spice.  The chilli in question is known locally as “mouse droppings”, since it is small and shrivelled.   Thailand’s famous red curry is made with these dried, crushed chillis.   Yellow curry, the least spicy, is made with spices like turmeric.  The most spicy is green curry, with the potent seeds left in.   The Thai chilli realizes its full potential in tom yum soup, combined with lime, fish sauce, ginger and lemongrass. When the ingredients are mixed just right, it will make you salivate just thinking about it for years to come (as I am doing just typing this).

India
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​A good, strong Indian curry will make your eyeballs sweat.  Traditionally, the spiciest Indian dish is the vindaloo, inspired by Portuguese visitors but perfected in India with a variety of chillies and peppers.   I find that drinking lightly carbonated Indian beer soothes an extra hot vindaloo’s burn to something almost bearable.  But I’d still place a roll of toilet paper in the fridge before you go to bed, for it is well known that strong curries always burn twice.

Mozambique
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​The African birds-eye chilli was spread around the world by Portuguese seafarers, and for good reason.  Known as peri peri, the small birds-eye releases a chemical that has been proven to trigger a sort of culinary buzz.   You can’t get addicted, but after years of craving a steady fix, I believe I’ve come pretty close.   You can also chase the peri-peri burn in Portugal, Brazil, and at a top notch South African franchise called Nandos Chicken worldwide. ​

USA
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​Lets hit the bayou with a little fixin’ of some of Louisiana’s finest. Tabasco brand pepper sauce is found around the world, and “blackened Cajun” rub has become a staple in many fish restaurants.  But the USA seems to have excelled in the manufacture and marketing of outrageous sauces, with quirky names like Satan’s Blood and Blair’s Mega Death Sauce.  One of the world’s spiciest dishes was traced to a shrimp cocktail in Indianapolis (heavy on the horseradish), while one restaurant in Chicago insists diners sign a waiver before sampling its XXX Hot Wings.  American food scientists have extracted the capsaicin compound that gives chilli peppers its kick.  It’s more a weapon than a food group.

Jamaican Jerk
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​The best fish I’ve ever had was on the Jamaican south coast, spiced with the wonderful Caribbean concoction popularly known as jerk.   Fish or meat is dry rubbed with a mixture of scallions, nutmeg, garlic, herbs, and the secret ingredient, the Scotch Bonnet Pepper.  Closely related to the habanero, the most fierce of household chillies, the Scotch Pepper is small and unassuming, like a nuclear bomb in a suitcase. When combined in the right combination, it creates a jerk sensation, a mouth-watering blend of heat and taste.

Szechuan, China
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Chinese cuisine is not afraid to use chillies, but the region most famous for its culinary heat is the Szechuan Province.   Perhaps its most famous dish is the hot pot, whereby different ingredients are added to a pot until everything is just right.  A locally grown “flower” pepper adds the heat the region is famous for. ​

Mexico
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​Jalapeno peppers are renowned the world over, although on the Scoville Scale they barely register.  Consider it has a rating of just 2500 to 8000, while the habanero lies somewhere between 100,000 and 350,000.  Mexicans tamed the habanero, a monster of a pepper, now used in most gimmicky hot sauces.  Fortunately it is used in Mexican kitchens sparingly, where moles (sauces) are prepared with that special combination of tomato, cilantro, lime, pepper, and sometimes chocolate.

SIDE NOTE: The World’s Spiciest Dish
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Phaal curry is made from various peppers, but there’s only one you should worry about.   The bhut jolokia, aka the nala jokolia, aka the ghost pepper, aka you-have-to-be-out-of- your-mind-to-eat-this-pepper pepper.   It’s been certified by the Guinness Book of Records as being the strongest pepper known to man, with a Scoville rating of over 1,000,000!   The thick Phaal curry is served in India and Pakistan, to diners who will shortly lose all communication with their oral cavity. ​