New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
Attention Chili-heads or people who enjoy watching their friends and family who are chili-heads, suffer immensely: here are five dishes within a short drive to put a hurting on you from lips to er…exit. Some even have challenges attached to them, for those who want a few minutes of local fame.
So what is the point of eating something so hot? This is an often asked question and one I’d like to reply with by borrowing George Mallory’s iconic response: “Because it’s there.”
There is a common misconception that chili-heads simply go for the hottest thing possible at every meal. Truth is we like heat, but the painful experiences are reserved for special occasions. There is a rather large variety flavor recipes to many of the bottled sauces on the market. Peppers can roasted, an assortment of citrus flavor from lime, orange, mango, pineapple, papaya, and even chocolate and cinnamon.
So whether you are looking for a challenge or have a bad case of Schadenfreude and want to watch your “stupid” friends suffer, here are five dishes you can find within an hour’s drive that will force you to ask the question “What did I get myself into?” and cry out “I WANT MY MOMMY!” Click on the title of each and it’ll lead you to their prospective website. Check out my previous articles on Rose Alley’s San Juan Challenge, Ghost of the Crazy Chicken, and East Coast Grill’s Pasta From Hell. Here is #4 …
Ayur-Shri’s Ghost Pepper Powder
Ayur-Shri restaurant serves one of my favorite cuisines on earth: Indian. I love exploring the different regional dishes, especially those that enjoy hurting you. India is home to some of the hottest peppers on the planet, most famously the Bhut Jolokia or Ghost Pepper, which was for a time the hottest, but now it has taken a shameful 2nd place to he Trinidad Moruga Scorpion pepper.
Anyhow, who can tell the difference between a pepper that is 1.3 million Scoville units and one that is almost 8 million Scoville units? It’s like asking someone if they can tell the difference from being stabbed with a steak knife or a paring knife or having your big toe smashed with a hammer or a rock.
Ayur-shri doesn’t advertise or promote that they have the world’s second hottest pepper ground into a powder available. Especially considering that every place I’ve been to that serves it, you have to sign a waiver acknowledging that you may have a heart attack and die. So you have to request it. There is no challenge except for the personal one you impose. You can sprinkle a tiny bit or smother your food. Either way, prepare for hot flashes, sweating, hiccups, pain, suffering, and hurt. Because it’s a powder some may go airborne and you may sniff it up into your nasal cavity. This is an experience similar to whatever it feels like to have someone run a cheese grater back and forth through your nose. So head to Sivalai, request the Ghost Pepper Powder and be the laughing stock of your friends.
Next up … Sivalai’s Pho.
