I made chili for a competition last weekend. I thought it would be fun to make Habanero Hellfire Chili. It had 6 fresh habaneros in it so I figured it would light me up. It had good flavor, but it was not hot. Tabasco has more heat than this chili did. Can you help me figure out why?
As I was making it I removed the seeds & membranes from the peppers, does that neuter them? Or were my peppers duds?
by BetterGhost
13 Comments
If I make my 7-alarm chili, I toss in 7-10 whole (minus the stems) habs in the blender with my tomatoes and such. It definitely lights people up.
The membrane is where most of the heat is contained. Or the white flesh within.
Should have upped the game and chucked a reaper in too.
Sorry to say but ya sabotaged yourself. Seeds and membranes are where all the spice lives.
Sometimes Habanero have weak heat. Gotta grab the smaller, darker orange ones. The big light orange ones seem to have less heat.
My buddy and I were making homemade spicy pasta sauce, enough for about 3 store bought size jars. We found our optimal spice level to be 15 carolina reapers, or about 5 per jar. It gets diluted, I don’t know how much you made but I’d imagine 6 habaneros would come out pretty mild.
Should have ground up the peppers WHOLE (remove stems) Seeds and membranes are the best for heat.
A lot of guys toast the seeds. Only time you remove the membrane is when you want to disarm the pepper.
How was the flavor?
Why did you remove the membranes?
As mentioned, next time don’t remove the seeds and membranes. Six whole habaneros should add a decent kick but won’t be anything crazy for a whole pot of chili.
The skin and pepper flesh holds most of the flavour, while the seeds and core generate the oil with capsaicin (the thing that tastes spicy) in it.
There is no need to remove the seeds and membranes.
I do not remove seeds or membranes when I make salsas. I live a good roasted pepper salsa. I roast or blister them whole, then I blend them whole. Seeds and membranes are where the heat is.