Chilli Pepper Bhut Jolokia Fiery Furnace
I suppose most sensible people would realise that by the very name of this pepper it was indeed going to be hot. Coupled with the fact that we had been writing about it on its introduction to the company – that yes, this was the hottest chilli you were ever most likely to eat, and bearing in mind the warnings to wash your hands after touching, do not by any means rub your eyes whilst handling – well any chilli really, and you’ve got enough information to avoid getting more steam up than the Flying Scotsman! But, or should I say Bhut, there are just some lessons in life that you have to learn the hard way…….
It was a cold night, Jack Frost had nipped around the garden having a gnaw at the citrus trees that I’d forgotten to cover up, the moon shone, next doors cat was having it’s neck wrung for doing something it shouldn’t (or it could have been one of the girls singing – I’m not quite sure!) So I thought I would cook up a nice hot dinner – Chilli Con Carne!
Nothing from a tin, jar or anything that had been lurking in the far corner of the bottom drawer of the fridge, for more than a fortnight, was going into this delicious concoction – this was the night for Chilli Bhut Jolokia and I had two! Tonight was going to be a Michelin style delight of culinary deliciousness…….. …….It wasn’t.
My initial thought was to put the two chillies in the dish. I had explained this to my colleague Toby earlier but noticed how suddenly his jaw dropped and as he fell back in his seat, he spluttered words that sounded suspiciously connected to blowing socks off and ‘are you mad woman?!’ I couldn’t quite make out at this point if he was in serious need of medical attention or doubled up in the throes of unhinged laughter. I alerted our first aider just to be on the safe side anyway and left them to it.
Now, I like to cook. There is something very satisfying about chopping garlic, onions, tomatoes (ok these did come from a tin) etc, and I was very careful to chop up my marigolds, sorry – wear my marigolds to chop up my chilli, wash the chopping board and the knife, before it touched any other item, living or dead. Then I added the chilli to my sauce…… I suppose when I saw the pan take a sharp intake of breath I should have thought something could be amiss, the tomatoes shrank and they began to absorb water at a rate of knots! The seasoning went in (plus an extra twist of the black pepper as I’m quite partial to biting the ones that get stuck in your teeth) then it was ready. The rice was dished out, the sauce placed on top and I sat down with my husband to enjoy our evening meal.
It didn’t quite turn out as I’d planned………..
My husband’s a fella who likes his food and has never been a dainty eater (he won’t mind me saying this) so of course he took a couple of large mouthfuls of his dinner. It was quite fascinating to watch really, I mean I had never seen this sort of occurrence before…. He started going red from the back of his head, up over the top and down to his lips and neck, beads of sweat were glistening, he sort of reminded me of a Christmas bauble, then he sprung up out of his chair, grabbed a glass of water and stood there with his tongue in the water, looking like he was about to explode! It was about two hours later before I could understand what he was saying; he’d had trouble with his ‘wips being on fwire’ he said.
We never ate anything that evening; I had to throw the whole lot away! What a waste!
So good people take my advice and only use a tiny tiny bit of this chilli, it is a fiery furnace – it says what it does on the tin as the saying goes! It may be advisable to just put the de -seeded pepper into the dish for a short while then take it out.
You have been warned!
