Pepper X: The world has a new hottest chilli
Pepper X scorches the previous record holder, the Carolina Reaper, by a million Scoville heat units
By Corryn Wetzel
17 October 2023
Pepper X is one hot l
Heatonist/Julian Bracero
Pepper X is the hottest chilli in the world, according to a statement from Guinness World Records. The chilli is around 500 times hotter than a jalapeno.
The squat, greenish-yellow pepper measures a whopping 2.69 million Scoville heat units (SHU). SHU is a scale of spiciness based on the concentration of capsaicinoids – a chemical irritant that makes peppers hot – in the plant. Pepper X outranked the previous record-holder, the Carolina Reaper, by around a million SHU.
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Ed Currie, who bred the Carolina Reaper a decade ago, is also behind Pepper X. Currie told the Associated Press that he developed the pepper after a friend sent him a different variety of chilli that was “brutally hot”. When Currie bred that pepper with the Carolina Reaper, it was even hotter. It took him around a decade of experimentation to cultivate Pepper X in his South Carolina greenhouses.
Currie managed to eat a whole Pepper X in a video posted online Monday. “I was feeling the heat for three-and-a-half hours,” Currie said. “Then the cramps came.”
In mammals like humans, capsaicin binds to a receptor in nerve cells that triggers the body’s inflammatory responses in the form of a burning sensation. Birds lack this molecular receptor, so they’re spared the spice when spreading seeds through their droppings.
