Spicy Burger Sends Two British Men to Hospital

[Grand Torino]

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/hot-hot-hot-spicy-burger-sends-two-british-men-hospital-n152836

 

A burger so spicy it requires diners sign a legal disclaimer before eating has sent two men to the hospital after they'd taken just a single bite each while testing the new product. The men, both journalists at England's The Argus newspaper, ordered the Hot Chilli Burger for lunch from Burger Off in Hove, England after seeing it advertised among the top hamburger restaurants in the country. One bite sent both Arron Hendy and Ruari Barratt to the hospital in ambulances. "Barratt took a bite and minutes later suffered severe stomach pains which increased. He lost the feeling in his hands, his legs were shaking and his eyes rolled back in his head," The Argus reported. â€œI was in so much pain I was telling people I felt like I was dying," Hendy, whose symptoms hit two hours later, told the paper.

 

Read more.

[peejman]

I've never understood stuff like that. If it's so hot that you can't taste anything, what's the point?

[Peace]

Purposely giving yourself a chemical burn is not something I have ever understood... but then again, I have never liked the thought of injuring myself or others.

Edited July 15, 2014 by Peace

[10-Ring]

We have a name for people like that.  We call them girls.

[TripleDigitRide]

We have a name for people like that.  We call them girls.

While I wouldn't even consider trying something that hot/spicy, unless being paid large sums of money, that it very funny.

[LagerHead]

I can't even imagine how hot this stuff is. I think the hottest stuff I have ever tried is Dave's Insanity, which comes in at about 500,000 - 750,000 Scoville units, and it is damn hot, but still pretty tasty. This stuff is more than 10 times that hot. WOW!

[JAB]

Yep.  I have been known to slice fresh habaneros up in my beans.  I have been known to cut fresh ghost peppers into (thin) slices and eat them straight up.  Heck, some of my buddies and I got together last Sunday and our host - who made bratwurst cooked in beer (yum) had a bowl of diced, fresh habaneros and ghost chiles to put on our brats (along with the green tomato, tomatillo and ghost chile chow chow that I made last week.)  All that said, ghost chiles average around one million Scoville units (twice as hot as some of the hottest habaneros - the hottest jalapenos top out around 10,000 Scoville) while the burger in the article, above (according to another article I read) is estimated to be around seven to nine million Scoville.  Seven to nine times hotter than a ghost chile.  I'm not sure that even I would want to try that.  Okay, maybe a little bite - but I'm not eating a whole one.

 

In Oak Ridge there is a place near the pool that is called "The Other One'.  They have burgers, sandwiches and the like.  Their burger menu is huge and has some oddities (including one burger that has two grilled cheese sandwiches as the 'buns'.)  They have one burger on which you can have any or all of the following:  Sauteed serranos (I think), sauteed jalapenos, sauteed habaneros and/or sauteed ghost chiles.  I have only been there once and unfortunately it was at a time when they didn't have any fresh ghost peppers, only dried, so I opted to go with all the peppers except for the ghost (I will go back soon now that fresh ghost peppers are available.)  There is a flashing, 'siren' type light they turn on whenever they are doing a burger with those peppers because they have basically an open kitchen and apparently want to warn the other patrons that they are about to get pepper gassed.  They had a special burger the day I was there which had chorizo mixed into the ground beef (not something they have all the time.)  That burger had pepper jack cheese, a cayenne based spice blend and chipotle mayonnaise.  It seems like their might have been some kind of house-made hot sauce, too, but I can't swear to it.  I ordered that burger with the aforementioned blend of sauteed chile peppers.  It was delicious.

Edited July 15, 2014 by JAB

[E4 No More]

There's a difference between "man-test hot" and tasty-hot. I like hot food, but it's stupid to just see who can take the hottest stuff that you can concoct.

[JAB]

I've never understood stuff like that. If it's so hot that you can't taste anything, what's the point?

 

Endorphins.  If you eat something hot enough, your body releases endorphins - which are the same things that give people the so-called 'runner's high' but without all that annoying running.  So, in addition to enjoying the flavor (for those of us who do) it can be a cheap, legal high that leaves you feeling relaxed and happy.

 

Of course, like most 'drugs', your tolerance grows the more you partake so you have to keep going hotter and hotter to get the same feeling.  What some folks consider 'so ridiculously hot it doesn't even have any flavor' might be only somewhat warm and pretty tasty to a serious chile head. 

 

Around here, most Indian and Thai restaurants have a scale of 1 to 5 for how hot you want your food to be with 1 being mild and 5 being very hot.  I order Indian hot or Thai hot which are off the scale.  Anything less than maybe a 4 or 5 and I can hardly eat it as it just doesn't taste 'right' to me - but both of those styles of cuisine are very good for having a lot of flavor even while setting your hair on fire.  My non chile-head friends have learned to be careful when asking me if something is hot.  It isn't that I would lie to them but honestly some things that create a 'two alarm fire' in some folks' taste buds don't even register with me.  This also means that I might find plenty of flavor in something that other folks might say is 'too hot to taste anything'.  Also, I actually like the flavor of ghost peppers (which have a nice, lemony taste when ripe) and habaneros (which have a somewhat 'smoky' citrus flavor when ripe.)  That isn't to say that some foods don't go for the heat to the detriment of flavor and I don't enjoy those foods, either.  I haven't had Hooter's Three Mile Island wings in years but seem to recall them fitting into that category - all heat and no flavor.  By contrast, the Braveheart wings at Wild Wing Cafe (their hottest) taste good, make me sweat, give me a serious endorphin rush and will completely clear my sinuses.  I can honestly only handle about five of those at a time.

Edited July 15, 2014 by JAB

[JAB]

There's a difference between "man-test hot" and tasty-hot. I like hot food, but it's stupid to just see who can take the hottest stuff that you can concoct.

 

It is also kind of funny to watch for 'pros' vs. 'amateurs' at a hot sauce shop where they have samples.  When sampling something really, really hot the 'pros' will dip up just a small amount while the 'amateurs' will dunk a chip in like they are eating salsa or something.

[E4 No More]

It is also kind of funny to watch for 'pros' vs. 'amateurs' at a hot sauce shop where they have samples.  When sampling something really, really hot the 'pros' will dip up just a small amount while the 'amateurs' will dunk a chip in like they are eating salsa or something.

True that.

 

Now I'm thinking Hot Chicken for lunch today! :)

[Mike.357]

I like hot stuff,  munch sport peppers like popcorn, but the story and what went on is plain old stupidity.

 

Hottest doesn't equal better

[jtmaze]

I used to go to hot sauce(salsa) festivals when I lived in Austin and the medium line is fun and the hot line you dip about 1/4 in. of chip in and wait for the sweat. As I get older I can't handle it like I used to. Just enough hot to clear my sinuses is fine. JTM We the People of the United States, in order to form a more Perfect Union......

[monkeylizard]

Their burger menu is huge and has some oddities (including one burger that has two grilled cheese sandwiches as the 'buns'.) 

 

I felt my arteries harden a little when I read that.

[BigK]

I love spicy foods, but there's a limit. The hottest Indian or Thai food I've had wouldn't be anywhere close to the heat the owner says is in the sauce on his burger. 

 

For my taste "hot enough" would be 5 stars at a Thai restaurant or the amount of heat in Hattie B's hot chicken or even the Blazing Hot wings at Buffalo Wild Wings.

 

The degree of heat in this gimmick burger is just silly to me.

[monkeylizard]

Prince's "regular" is about all I can comfortably handle. After that, it's just saw dust.

[E4 No More]

Prince's "regular" is about all I can comfortably handle. After that, it's just saw dust.

I've heard of Prince's Hot Chicken but haven't been there. I went to Hot Stuff at Bell & Blue Hole today at lunch. I had their XXHot which is good, but it's certainly talking to me now. I guess I'm like JTMaze in that as I get older I become less tolerant.

[peejman]

Clearly the definition of "hot" is highly subjective.  Stuff that I would say has flavor but wasn't real hot would make my mother-in-law's head explode (which gives me an idea....   :cool:  ).  I had wings at one of the wing places (I forget which) that had a mango habanero sauce that I thought was quite hot, but was very good.  I had to take a little break in the middle of the plate, but I ate them.  I've eaten sliced habaneros and that was about as hot as I can stand.  I've had Hooter's 3 Mile Island wings and thought they were terrible.  Just hot, no flavor.  I'm not a fan of the "buffalo" type sauces.  I also don't like hot Indian food... a little curry goes a long way for me.  I've had hot Thai food and thought it was good.  I'm going to have to try this much revered "hot chicken" at some point. 

[monkeylizard]

Nashville is the home of hot chicken. Prince's is the gold standard, but it's a dump in a crappy part of town. Hattie B's and 400 degrees are where you go if you're willing to give up a little dive authenticity for a better health score.

[JohnC]

Around here, most Indian and Thai restaurants have a scale of 1 to 5 for how hot you want your food to be with 1 being mild and 5 being very hot.  I order Indian hot or Thai hot which are off the scale.  Anything less than maybe a 4 or 5 and I can hardly eat it as it just doesn't taste 'right' to me - but both of those styles of cuisine are very good for having a lot of flavor even while setting your hair on fire.

 
 
The problem I have is getting the Thai and Indian restaurants to give me true Thai or Indian hot because they think I don't know how hot it really is. For me, the pepper heat is a big part of the flavor. :up: 
 
I've had one Thai restaurant to actually get it right. But I've been many times and they're just too inconsistent with their heat, so sometimes it's American hot and rarely it's authentic Thai or Indian hot. :shrug:

[GlockSpock]

Oh you guys. I came home yesterday after reading through this at work and craving spicy stuff. I cooked me up some chili curry salmon on rice that I mixed in some ghost pepper hot sauce.

It was good:)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[JAB]

 
 
The problem I have is getting the Thai and Indian restaurants to give me true Thai or Indian hot because they think I don't know how hot it really is. For me, the pepper heat is a big part of the flavor. :up: 
 
I've had one Thai restaurant to actually get it right. But I've been many times and they're just too inconsistent with their heat, so sometimes it's American hot and rarely it's authentic Thai or Indian hot. :shrug:

 

My favorite Thai restaurant ever has been closed for well over a decade, now.  It was the first Thai I ever ate.  It was on 'The Strip' right next to the campus of UTK and was owned by a brother and sister, from Thailand, who also traded out kitchen duties.  On one of my first visits there, with the sister in the kitchen, my buddy and I asked the waitress to ask the cook to make ours as hot as she would make it for herself.  That was before I knew about the term 'Thai hot.'  Well, obviously she was concerned that we couldn't eat it that hot so she held back.  When the food came and we asked for additional crushed pepper, she came out of the kitchen to get a good look at us and said, "Okay, next time I make hot."  After that, when we would make the same request she would stick her head out of the kitchen door, see that it was us, smile and wave then proceed to make our food really hot.

[JAB]

I used to go to hot sauce(salsa) festivals when I lived in Austin and the medium line is fun and the hot line you dip about 1/4 in. of chip in and wait for the sweat. As I get older I can't handle it like I used to. Just enough hot to clear my sinuses is fine. JTM We the People of the United States, in order to form a more Perfect Union......

 

I sample various hot sauces at the Pepper Palace in Gatlinburg whenever I am there.  The hottest ones really get my attention, to say the least.  Just about the only one I don't think I would try, again, was one called 'Da Bomb".  It wasn't their 'regular' hot sauce but one of their hotter ones - either Da Bomb: Beyond Insanity or Da Bomb: Ground Zero.  I am thinking it was Ground Zero.  Anyhow, the way the guy at the counter explained it to me was that this sauce had a lot of orange juice as the base.  Apparently, according to him, orange juice makes your taste buds kind of 'open up' - almost like having pores on your tongue open - which allows the hot components to really get in there.  Well, I think it worked just that way because that stuff hurt me.  Thing is, it wasn't really a 'burning' sensation like most hot sauces.  I can ride that out and likely enjoy it even when the sauce is really hot.  This felt more like someone was using my tongue for a pin cushion.  Seriously - it felt like I had a bunch of needles stuck in my tongue.

[JAB]

Oh you guys. I came home yesterday after reading through this at work and craving spicy stuff. I cooked me up some chili curry salmon on rice that I mixed in some ghost pepper hot sauce.

It was good:)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

I wanted something spicy yesterday evening, too.  I would really like to try some of this 'hot chicken' of which the Nashville guys speak.  Unfortunately, it seems to be a very Nashville-centric kind of thing and I don't think it is available anywhere in or around Knoxville.  If any of you folks who have had the real deal know of a recipe that yields similar results at home then I'd like to hear about it.

 

I ended up meeting a friend (my ex-wife, actually - yeah, she and I are still friends) at the recently opened Big Kahuna Wings in Farragut.  They do 'naked' wings with a dry spice blend on them and serve a choice of sauce on the side.  Even their 'Original Fire' spice blend isn't very hot but it has a great flavor (if they would do a super spicy version I wouldn't even need sauce.)  I tried the honey-Sriracha sauce, which was different and pretty good - and the FIre sauce, which is their hottest.  The 'Fire' sauce was also good but wasn't really all that super spicy, to me.  I would say that its heat level was about on par with Scorned Woman hot sauce.  In fact, it tasted a little like Scorned Woman - but not enough for me to think that it was.