After a man was hospitalized from eating it, the creator of the Carolina Reaper is defending it to detractors.
The chili grower who created the hottest pepper in the world, the Carolina Reaper, has been forced to come to his cherished creation’s defense after it hospitalized a man who ate it as part of a contest, leading some to question whether such a pepper should be allowed for public consumption. Salvatore Genovese, who grows the chili on a British farm, told Sky News that people need to properly cook the pepper before eating it to prevent health risks from the extremely hot pepper.
Genovese points out that he has sold half a million Carolina reapers in the past couple years and no one has complained or been hospitalized that he is aware of. He said people should not be simply putting it in their mouths and chewing as if it were a normal pepper.
Instead, use it to infuse flavor slowly into a curry, so you only get the essence of the flavors rather than the direct heat from the pepper.
Genovese was responding to a report released by the British Medical Journal of a 34-year-old man who bit into a Carolina reaper directly as part of a 2016 chili eating contest in upstate New York.
Daniel J. Brown
Daniel J. Brown (Editor-in-Chief) is a recently retired data analyst who gets a kick out of reading and writing the news. He enjoys good music, great food, and sports, with a slant towards Southern college football, basketball and professional baseball.