- [Melissa] This is the world's hottest pepper.
- [Speaker #2] These are the Carolina Reapers.
The Carolina Reaper.
- [Speaker #3] This is the hottest thing
I've ever eaten in my life.
(man screaming)
- This is very hot.
- And I'm gonna train to eat it.
- This seems unethical.
- [Melissa] Thank you to Helix Sleep
for sponsoring a portion of this video.
For context,
I usually avoid spicy food whenever I go out.
I like to enjoy my food, and whenever I have spicy food,
I feel like I'm in pain.
But it makes me kind of sad, because I feel
like I'm missing out on so many dishes
from around the world, and I'd love to be able to try them.
But I can't, because I just can't handle the heat.
You know, dishes like jerk chicken,
I need to get it very mild.
Szechuan hot pot, that hot Korean soup,
you know what I'm talking about?
Looks very good.
Too spicy.
And I can't even eat some of the foods from my own culture,
which is upsetting to me,
and probably even more upsetting to my family.
And today we're gonna fix that.
If I can train myself to eat the world's Spiciest pepper,
which is the Carolina Reaper,
then theoretically I can handle anything, right?
Alright, let's do this.
So I went online to see if I can gain some wisdom.
We measure spiciness in Scoville units,
that represents the concentration of capsaicin in a pepper,
the compound that makes pepper spicy.
It looks like I have a lot of peppers to buy.
Let's go shopping. (lid clicking)
Peppers vary across the scale,
ranging from zero to up to 2 million Scoville units.
Bigger number, the hotter the pepper.
Mission accomplished.
So we have our peppers here.
Now the plan is to expose myself to hotter
and hotter peppers until the hot pepper is not hot anymore.
So we're gonna start with a shishito pepper.
Then we're gonna go with a poblano pepper.
Then we got a jalapeño, cayenne pepper,
red Thai chili, habanero pepper, and a scotch bonnet.
And then the Carolina Reaper pepper.
- [Computer] Regret.
- I haven't opened it from the package yet
'cause I've been scared,
but I guess we're gonna open it now.
(Melissa coughing)
Oh my gosh, I can smell them.
I have to eat that?
So it's just look scary.
While we are here, and we have all of these peppers,
I'm gonna leave that there.
Why don't we do a little test and see how far we can get,
before things get too spicy?
Hold up.
(milk splashing) Put those here.
Does this look like hot ones?
(pepper crunching)
Easy. Maybe 'cause I'm not getting any of the seeds,
but that actually is kind of tasty.
Okay, this is where I'm getting a little scared.
Time for a jalapeño. (sighs) (pepper crunching)
That one tastes better than the first one.
Maybe I'm just built different. I didn't know.
(pepper crunching) This one's not hot.
(Melissa coughing) Take a breath.
I got a seed.
Oh, that's hot. (coughing)
This next one is one that I'm actually really scared for.
It's the cayenne pepper.
Cheers. (pepper crunching)
Mhm. That one's burning a little bit.
(Melissa groaning) (Melissa coughing)
It's hot. It's just gonna get worse from here.
(Melissa panting)
I should put an ice cube in there.
(freezer door slamming)
So my tongue isn't on fire anymore.
Out of curiosity, let's eat the red Thai chili.
I might regret this.
(pepper crunching)
Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
(coughing) I don't think, I'm tapping out here.
So I'm supposed to start shooting a couple weeks ago
giving myself an entire 30 days to do this challenge.
However, 'cause of my own self,
I have 10 days until I need to wrap shooting.
Got a lot less time than I thought I did.
But that is fine, because I did some math.
And if I have about three meals a day for the next 10 days,
that is 30 meals, that is almost like 30 days.
But that really means that I need to start now.
Consider this the official start to our challenge.
(pepper crunching)
It just kind of tastes like a regular pepper.
I dunno why I was procrastinating this.
(Melissa coughing)
I began day one with the poblano pepper.
As I was eating these peppers, my mouth hurt,
and my tongue felt like it was on actual fire.
It was definitely spicier, but apparently that's normal.
Spiciness isn't a taste,
it's a physical response where sweetness,
saltiness, and bitterness affect your taste buds.
Spiciness, specifically capsaicin,
attacks your heat receptors.
So that's why when we eat spicy food
we feel hot, or you feel like you need to sweat.
I also learned
that the seeds are not the hottest part of a pepper.
It's actually the veins that carry capsaicin,
and it's most concentrated in the pit of a pepper,
or the center of it.
So this is a jalapeño pepper.
I feel like this is a pepper
that most people are familiar with.
So you're gonna watch me eat it while I talk
about the sponsor of this portion of today's video.
(Melissa coughing)
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Sweet dreams.
I can't sleep.
I must go and eat more peppers.
(covers rustling)
Now I won't lie.
Eating these peppers was very unpleasant, but I kept going.
But to tell you the truth,
I really don't know if it was working.
Eventually, I think I started eating peppers like popcorn,
'cause I realized that my time was running out,
and I needed to just eat more faster.
So as I kept eating these peppers,
the pain of eating them started to ease up.
It's the last one.
But the pain in my stomach was a different story.
And I don't think anyone wants to know more
about that.
Poor stomach.
I think I'm ready to eat the Carolina Reaper.
Water, a glass for oat milk if I need it.
My oat milk, a glove for safety.
I texted my friends, I'm about to eat the pepper.
So if I stop responding to their messages,
they know why. (package crackling)
This is it.
I'm procrastinating taking a bite.
(laughs) Oh my God.
Okay, I'm gonna bite it now.
(pepper crackling)
(Melissa groaning)
Oh, that was disgusting. My mouth is on fire.
Oh my God. (Melissa panting)
(milk swishing) Mm-mm.
(bell dinging)
It was this moment that she realized
that oat milk was not going to save her.
Casein is a protein that binds itself
to the heat receptor to neutralize the burn.
Oat milk does not have that. Dairy does,
which is why I grabbed some Greek yogurt.
My eyes are watering. I only took a tiny bite.
(Melissa panting)
I'm gonna call my friends and let them know what happened.
- What has happened?
- You're alive.
- There's a tear stuck in my eyeball, but I won't-
- Bro- - Don't touch it.
Oh my- - Keep your hands a...
No, my God. (both laughing)
(R2D2 screaming)
- Look how much I ate.
- What I'm seeing is a full pepper.
- This is so disappointing.
- I think you're lying.
I don't think you ate it.
- Do you want me to eat more of it?
(Sabrina laughing) - Kind of.
- If you were on the phone with me five minutes ago,
I would not have been a human.
(all laughing) I feel so warm right now.
But also, I don't know why I did that.
- And we have to do this for Patreon.
- Mhm.
- What if we just cut the Patreon?
- All in favor of canceling the Patreon?
(film clicking)
- These two will be eating a Carolina Reaper.
(peppers crackling)
- Here it comes. - I'm going.
I got to find milk!
- You seem fine.
- What if you take another bite?
- Oh, I kind of don't wanna watch this.
(Melissa laughing) - I do.
- Okay friends, I guess you're not my friends.
Actually, you're making me eat this.
(pepper crackling) - Oh.
(Sabrina laughing)
- [Sabrina] My God, it's a big bite.
- [Taha] Oh no.
- Oh... - My temperature is rising.
I need to take this glove off.
- I don't know if I want to do this.
(Sabrina and Taha laughing) - Why?
- It's so hot.
It's so hot.
- In fairness,
I don't know what I expected.
I obviously didn't expect Melissa to pass away.
(Sabrina laughing)
- I thought I was gonna pass away, so I wore black to mourn.
(Sabrina laughing)
- [Taha] Do you think this helped
with your spice tolerance, then?
- I have no idea.
'Cause I've never eaten anything that hot in my life.
- Have you had spicy food yet?
- Have you eaten anything except for chili peppers
the past week?
- No.
- I feel like there's a serious flaw
in the methodology here. (Sabrina laughing)
- Oh, what do I do now?
- [Taha] Just go to a restaurant and be like,
"Can I have something spicy, please?"
And enjoy the flavors of spice.
- I'm gonna go eat food now, because the peppers
have taken over my brain and my sanity.
Okay, so I think that Sabrina and Taha were right.
There was definitely a flaw in my methodology.
The new plan is to go and eat
at a whole bunch of restaurants.
I hope this will be a lot more fun.
When I started this journey,
I was afraid of eating spicy food.
But I did this challenge 'cause I wanted to know
what I was missing.
I didn't understand why it was necessary
to have spice in a dish.
And when I was eating, it surprised me that I was able
to look past the spiciness and actually enjoy the food.
And I think that was because I had spent
a very unpleasant week eating peppers.
I know it's kind of crazy, but tongue hurts a little bit.
But it was actually enjoyable.
Could this be working?
This is David, chef and restaurant owner.
- It's not just about spice level.
It's like such an integral characteristic
in the food culture.
It's pretty obvious when you eat a dish where
chilies are foundational to it,
when you eat it and it doesn't have that,
there's a massive component that's missing.
Like mapo tofu,
I can't imagine eating a mapo tofu without it being spicy.
If it weren't spicy, it just would be a different dish.
- [Melissa] I noticed the spiciness in the dish,
but it was complimented with all these other flavors.
- [David] Acidity is a good one. And sweetness.
Honey, sugar, sweet sauces, balance it out nicely.
- [Melissa] It added this new layer to the experience
of eating that I wasn't expecting to enjoy so much.
And with this newfound appreciation for spicy food,
there was just one more thing that I wanted to try.
I promised y'all that I would eat a Carolina Reaper,
and I'm gonna do that, but in a more fun way.
- [Noah] Hot sauce is food that goes on food.
And to me it's all about flavor and enjoyment
and having fun.
- This is Noah, hot sauce expert and creator
of some pretty popular hot sauces that you might recognize.
- [Speaker #4] The Last Dab.
Here we are at the finish line.
This is The Last Dab.
- [Noah] It has to have good flavor.
To me, that's when I feel the best is when they say,
"Sure, there's a lot of stuff that's hot out there,
"but yours actually taste really good."
To me, spicy food is kind of like seeing a movie in color.
Once you know that those things exist,
it's really not as great of an experience
to just see a movie in black and white.
If you were watching Jurassic Park that way, you'd know
that you were missing a big part of the experience.
And for me, that's what eating not-spicy food is like.
Some people get the wrong idea about hot sauce
and get scared of it, thinking that hot sauce is all this,
you know, scary painful thing, when really,
there's a hot sauce for everybody.
Even if you don't like spice at all
I know that I'll find something perfect for you.
- Mm, that is so good.
(bowl rattling)
I'm cruising right now. This is delicious.
Okay, I'm gonna rinse out the bowl for this one,
because I feel like this one is going to need it.
- [Noah] The Last Dab: Apollo.
Yeah, be careful with that if you're still
just getting into spice,
that's not for the faint of heart.
- [Melissa] It actually uses a hybrid of the Carolina Reaper
and Pepper X.
Pepper X is notably hotter than the Carolina Reaper,
but it's not officially noticed
by the Guinness Book of World Records.
So it's not officially the hottest pepper in the world,
but it's hotter.
- Me and Chris Schonberger, who's the creator of Hot Ones,
we both ate The Last Dab: Apollo
on the wing for the first time.
And we're both sitting there like, huh, tastes good.
And like I can feel it under my tongue. Five minutes later,
we're both sitting there with tears pouring down our faces,
and he says,
"I think this is too hot to give to celebrities." (laugh)
- Okay, that's quite a bit, that is a lot of hot sauce.
(bowl rattling)
And for all of you Hot Ones fans out there,
I'm putting a little bit extra on the last wing.
Okay, I'm just gonna eat it now.
That's a lot.
Overall, I'm really glad that I went on this journey
and got to experience this whole new dimension of food.
(coughing) Oh wow.
And learn from the best on how spice can be used
to unlock even more complex flavors.
That was hot! (coughing)
If you would like more content like this,
(Melissa panting)
subscribe to our Patreon.
So if you're scared of spicy food like I was,
I'm gonna ask you to give it a try.
Just don't eat the Carolina Reaper. I...
I regret that.