I make powders, jellies, mustards, sauces and yes, even use them in salsas. The super hots are insanely hot so the trick is to use in moderation based on your heat tolerance.

I am not as advanced as Ottawapepper's multiuse of super hots. I use in hot sauce mainly or dry for pepper flakes or add to foods like chili. But with the hot sauce after mixing the other for ingredients for the sauce it tones down the heat. I ate a Bhut raw, insane! but yet I can add 12 and make two bottles of hot sauce and it's fine don't get me wrong it's still insane fire just not comparable to eating raw IMHO.

Yeah, I'd say hot sauces where you just add a small amount to your food or flakes/powder (possibly a blend with other lower heat peppers) would be most common. I haven't grown any super-hots yet (this year is my first with a couple 7-pods), but, that's how I treat the hotter varieties I have grown.

Yeah, these bad boys are *WAY* too hot for your normal recipes. Normal bell peppers are 0 scovilles (the unit used to describe the heat of a pepper), jalapenos are about 2k shu (scoville heat units), your habaneros generally weigh in at 30-50k shu.

The bhut jolokia generally tops 1 million scovilles. The Moruga averages 1.4 million (with some outlayers being over 2 million shu). The Trinidad Scorpion you've got will either be the mildest (at around 800k) or the hottest (also around 1.4 million).

They aren't hot peppers. They are weaponized fruit. The 7-pot pepper got its name because the people that originally grew it would put one whole, unbroken pod into a pot of stew to season it, then re-use it for another pot, and another, getting 7 pot's worth of hot stew out of one pod. They would refuse to break the pod open because it would then be too hot to eat.

So yeah, fair warning on those. Buy vinyl gloves at the very least (not rubber or latex, the heat will eat through those and soak into your skin, has to be vinyl), and don't be stupid enough to try eating one unless you are well prepared to face your own mortality.

Other than that, welcome to the club, these peppers are AWESOME! =D

I grow them to have on hand when someone starts talking about how they can eat extremely hot stuff. Problem is, the conversation ends at the point I challenge to eat one measly little pepper.

Bruce

Bruce, LOL!

I use them in salsas, chili and many other dishes. I make hot sauces. I also like to cut them into rings and put them on burgers or in salads etc. I also dry them to make chili flakes/powder. Super hots also have super flavor, so don't require a lot in any dish. The one thing I love about superhots is that when in a dish, the heat is more on the back of the throat rather then the tip of the tongue which is a lot more comfortable.

I have also used them to get out of having to bring alcohol to parties. I have vodka that I put a bhut in until it turned white that I took to the last one of those. I was specifically told I was never allowed to bring alcohol of any kind to any party ever again.

Nuclear hot peppers are really freaking good at making "Gotcha!" infusions with. The capsaicin dissolves easily into alcohol so you can't taste it at first. After you swallow and your body heat makes the residue in your mouth evaporate and deposit cap, oh lordy lordy lordy!

LMAO at Edymnion!! That is a cool idea and I have seen on Food Network a place that infuses their vodka with habs and makes bloody marys, serves ice cold shots, etc with it. I might do that! Oohhhhh ... JELLO SHOTS WITH INFUSED VODKA AND TEQUILA!

I make jellies as well and am already planning my 2012 flavors. I also can salsa and have noticed that the hot water bath seems to mellow out the heat of wicked hot peppers.

For pretty.. I take an empty booze bottle (not sure how it got empty) and fill it with peppers, pour boiling hot vinegar in it and then cap it. You can use the vinegar, the peppers, or just look at it. Patron bottles work really well because they have a cork stopper. I usually stalk the local watering hole and when a Patron bottle gets low I stake a claim. Fireball whiskey also has a cool bottle that hots would look good in.

I'm going to have a lot of peppers this year and am too lazy to roast so I will be keeping an eye on this post as well!

Erin

Hey, everyone, thanks for all the replies. I think I'll give a shot a drying a few for flakes and maybe making a hot sauce of my own - anyone have any pointers for a recipe?

FYI: After I told my wife about the peppers, she now wants me to grow them outside of my regular peppers and fenced off, so my son can't get near them... And I'm not sure I disagree. He has the tendency to want to eat some of our produce fresh off of the plants.

Powder,hot sauce,salsa, spicy pickles, and much much more!

On the alcohol side, I also cut thin Bhut rings and put them in Bloody Caesars instead of Tabasco sauce. Works great!

Well, if you want to break your son of that habit, leaving them in the normal garden would be sure to do it.

Eating one won't actually hurt him, but by God he'll never sneak off and eat anything out of the garden behind your back again!

Hot sauce pointers Vinagar look for 5% on the label, salt ( I use sea salt), optional you could add a fruit or add an acidic fruit like lemon or something else to your taste then the rest of the ingredients up to your imagination. Keep in fridge, if you intend to preserve or keep shelf stable please follow proper canning/preserving guides.

Forgot to mention the Vinegar 5% is labeled 5% acidity

This is my first year to grow hot peppers.... I am keeping my eye out for a dehydrator and coffee grinder to make my own powdered spice.
I think I might try that vinegar recipe as well... sounds great!
I also have about 3 people lined up to eat whole peppers :)

I use a fairly cheap dehydrator I got from Walmart. They should only run you ~$20 these days. As for a coffee grinder, I never bothered with one. My blender has a grind setting that reduces my peppers to a powder quite nicely without having to buy any new hardware.

Coffee beans need a grinder because of how hard they are. Dried peppers, not so much.

I just used the $10 coffee bean grinder. That worked great but unless you really clean it good, you better watch out with the next pot of coffee. I bought a separate one for peppers and they really do a good job of turning the dried peppers to powder. I already have two dehydraters that I use for making beef jerky and other things. But it doesn't take a lot to dry peppers and, like Edymnion says, a cheap dehydrator will work fine for that purpose.
Bruce

I also use the cheap coffee grinder (that's kind of like a small blender). I have one I use for peppers only. Coffee goes into another (slightly better) grinder. :-)

I read somewhere that whatever you use for grinding "super hot" peppers should be dedicated to that purpose only.
didn't realize the dehydrator and grinder were so cheap... looks like I'm going to WalMart!!! :)

If you use a blender check and see if it's like mine is.A mason jar screws right on it.
No dust etc.Makes it so you don't have dust blowing around when you grind.
More better.
You just turn the jar over after everything is ground up and cap it.
No muss no fuss...
Choose any size jar that screws in or even an old mayo jar if you are grinding enough peppers.
Getting powder out of a blender sucks.The glass jar works best and mason jars come in a couple sizes that have the same mouth size.

scotty66,

Whoa, a few things to consider...

If you're going to buy the cheapest dehydrator out there, I'd recommend that you use it outside. First; you won't gas yourself with capsicum fumes and second; there have been sporadic reports of cheap units melting down and causing fires.

When considering grinders, are you going to want to use it for something else like herbs, coffee, etc.? If not, no worries. If so, you may want to consider a higher end unit that has a detachable stainless steel bowl that's easily washed like this

It may be $10 extra but worth it IMHO.

Also, depending upon how clumsy or you are or the volume you're grinding, you may want to add one of these to your shopping list ;-))

To any nuclear newbies, the above is not a joke. It is not an exaggeration. When dealing with million plus scoville peppers, heavy vinyl gloves (vinyl, not latex, not rubber, as the capsaicin will eat through those like they weren't even there), and face protection.

I would honestly not laugh if someone said they had a full body hazmat suit they wore while preparing some of these things.

Yes, the are that hot.

The grinder would be for peppers only (I'm not a coffee drinker - gasp!)... I might upgrade the dehydrator based you comments though, I'm allergic to house fires!

I was inspired to make my own powder by this video (he's only grinding habanero, nothing nuclear): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-2yXw9tWVk4&feature=plcp

I did take notice that he waits a minute or two for the dust to settle after grinding. and yes, I would do it outside, on a calm day, and be very patient. maybe i'll buy a hazmat suit at walmart as well :)

I don't mess with dehydrator fumes etc.
Smoke dry them.
Don't need a smoker.
A LOW heat,small pile of coals in your BBQ works if you put the coals on one side and the heat on the other.
If you want to cheat but get smokey flavored dry pods, Half dry them in the BBQ then dehydrate them or Dry them in the dehydrator half way,spray them down with liquid smoke and water them,, dry them the rest of the way.
BE VERY CAREFUL about the water to liquid smoke mix you use.
Since I cold smoke everything that grows,flies,swims,walks or crawls , I have only read about using liquid smoke.
The stuff is not something I am familiar with personally.
I hear it comes in a couple flavors...

Make some chilli Vodka :)

I don't do the super hots, but I roll with some that do.

Tip: Grind outside if you're going to grind...unless you have some really nice almost totally air/dust-tight grinder. Even then be careful opening the bin you just ground into.

quote, "Tip: Grind outside if you're going to grind."

sounds like an awesome t-shirt quote... lol

You can pick up a few at South Padre island next spring.

If you're going to buy the cheapest dehydrator out there, I'd recommend that you use it outside. First; you won't gas yourself with capsicum fumes and second; there have been sporadic reports of cheap units melting down and causing fires.
Hot or super-hot peps dried at relatively low temps (~100� F or less) do not release much capsaicinoid. Unless prepping a large quantity of them at once, no real problem (at least for me) drying them inside at this temp but there will be some pungent volative molecules released... which will become not noticable within a day or so. An important consideration when handling them or grinding them is to avoid getting capsaicinoids in one's eyes.

Regggie

scotty66, "I'm allergic to house fires!", wow, sorry to worry you. Thousands of the cheap ones are sold and used each year without incident. Just wanted to suggest that you may want to use a cheap one away from combustible sources like walls, tables etc. I use two cheap ones to dry peppers in my garage on a concrete floor. They're basically glorified hair dryers. Use them wherever you'd be comfortable leaving a hair dryer running for a few days.

Go ahead and buy a cheap one but be aware of the remote risk it may melt down. If you can find a cheap one with temperature control, buy it. Peppers retain capsaicin and colour dried at around 95F.

No worries ottawapepper... I was just being a wise-ass. I was planning on dehydrating (and grinding) outside on the patio (no combustibles around).

how long does dehydrating with these machines take?

Not very long really. Depending on how high you have it set, how humid the surrounding air is and how thick walled the peppers are, it should take just a few hours. Make sure you cut open the peppers before you dry them. Don't try to dry them whole or it will take a long time. At least halve them before drying. I also suggest drying on a lower temp for a longer time. It seems to dry them more evenly. 120 degrees is good. Adjust higher or lower as you desire.

Ohhhh, one other piece of advice regarding dehydrating super hots. Make sure you completely clean the trays after wards. I didn't one time and almost ruined a 10 pound batch of beef jerky. I usually add some pepper poweder to the marinade of my beef jerkey but just the residue from previously drying a bunch of Nagas the day before made the jerky nearly inedible. On a positive note, I didn't have to worry about it disappearing in two days like most of jerky batches do.

Bruce

To any nuclear newbies, the above is not a joke. It is not an exaggeration. When dealing with million plus scoville peppers, heavy vinyl gloves (vinyl, not latex, not rubber, as the capsaicin will eat through those like they weren't even there), and face protection.

C'mon Ed, I cut fresh Bhuts and Habs without gloves of any kind.

It's awesome being able to sit on the couch afterward, sucking your fingers and getting a nice hit of cap from under your fingernails. :)

The only trick is making sure you don't touch anything "sensitive" when it's potty time. You only make that mistake once.

Yah, Mbellot, I am sure your wife/significant other/kids really enjoy it too. I am guessing that they treat you like you have leprosy when you are using your fingers as Capsicum Popsicles.
Bruce

working the weekend and got too much time on my hands.

Yes you do.
Bruce

*golf clap*

Half go into Best of Fair Hot Pepper Relish; the rest are air dried, crushed, and saved for use as cat repellant, a little sprinlke goes a long way in discouraging using nicely turned soil as a litter box!

Hehehe, not much to add here ;-)
Please consider all of the above advice!

Josh

Except for the bhut jolokia contraception. In fact, its probably best if your girlfriend/wife never even knows you saw that. If she did, you probably wouldn't need one of them for at least a month.