Chilli Challenge!

It all started with pickled dry chilli during the dinner time. Bishu said, “It’s got good flavour but not challenging at all.”

“What do you mean? Chillies are hot and spicy and that’s what it is?,” I retorted back.

“But to what degree? It’s too mild,” he said.

Alright then. And thus started a chilli adventure. We began with fresh jalapeños from the Dandenong market and tried them. No, it was not hot at all. They look so fresh, crispy and green but just baby mild.

“Get some ghost chilli next week, please,” Bishu suggested and we did that. It was okay but we found Cassatta and Bird’s eye better.

In fact our dinner time turned into a chilli time as we looked out for more spicy varieties. “Tobasco sauce?” One of the Chinese friends suggested us and we tried.

“Oh it gave a real kick,” Bishu said and added how one of his friends finished a bottle of Tobasco sauce and threw out the whole night.

It was a big joke when Bruce, our landlord, asked my husband if he liked chilli. As soon as he got the positive reply, Bruce rushed inside his kitchen and came out with a plate of garden-fresh red chillies and asked my husband to eat them all on the spot. Bruce was just being funny.

So what could be the real hot chilli was still a question until we found out that it is Trinidad Scorpion Butch T. The literature related to this variety says that one requires wearing protective gears just to touch it. The image of the explosive chilli is very close to our Akabare.

The chilli stories got the added flavour when we ordered extra hot pizza on the father’s day evening. The pizza man delivered so spicy pizzas that we could not finish them all. And the chilli contest was over. However, we still have to go and ask the pizza man was it Trinidad Scorpion Butch T chilli that he used on pizzas that day?

The next morning Bishu enthusiastically shared his finding, “Probably our grandfather was right as he used to say chillies are the swords for tongue.”

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