Ruth Reichl is obsessed with chiles.
So the August, 2008 issue of Gourmet is exploding with hot stuff. In “Datil Be Fine,” roadfoodies Jane and Michael Stern write about the datil pepper, a smoldering habanero relative, a “slow-rolling capsicum wave that swells with sweet-tart citrus zestiness” in Minorcan clam chowder in St. Augustine, Florida. Pennsylvania farmer Tim Stark dishes about his customers’ craving for the fieriest chiles in “Burning Love,” an excerpt from his upcoming book, Heirloom. (Best anecdote: the photographer who bought 8 bushels of red chiles so Penelope Cruz could lie upon them in a promo shot for Woman on Top.) And in “This Rough Magic,” Ronnie Lundy drives through northern New Mexico, sampling red and green chiles along the way.
It was Karen Coates’ quest for the bhut jolokia (world’s hottest pepper at 1,001,304 Scoville units) that really captured my heart. In “The Red Hot Chile Peppers,” she eats her way through remote villages in northeast India’s Nagaland; her first taste of the fabled pepper—“a piece the size of a pinhead”-- made her “woozy and high. After half an hour, when the pain stopped, I craved more.” The bhut jolokia is not just incendiary: It apparently has “a fruity flavor” conquered “by instant flames.”
So why are hot peppers hot? In yesterday’s Science Times (“The Greater the Threat, the Hotter the Chili,” The New York Times, August 12, 2008, p. D3), Henry Fountain writes that a study of wild Bolivian chili plants by the University of Washington shows that “the variation in heat reflects the risk that the plants will be attacked by a seed-destroying fungus.” According to the study, “peppers in the more humid and wet north [part of Bolivia] had more evidence of infection by a fungus that killed seeds, introduced to the fruits by insects that bored into them.” These peppers tend to be much hotter than those in the drier south. Higher levels of capsaicinoids, which produce peppers’ “characteristic heat, are the chili’s way of deterring microbes.”
You’ll notice, perhaps, the difference in the way Gourmet and The Times spell the word: “chile” and “chili,” respectively. This is a vexing—and perplexing--debate to which there may not be a definitive answer. I'll tackle the question in an upcoming post.
Comments (1)
I remember reading the article in Gourmet magazine. I doubt I could handle the bhut jolokia.
Posted by Ursula Ayrout | August 15, 2008 5:58 PM
Posted on August 15, 2008 17:58