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Unlock the secrets of peppers that have spiced up our world for over 6,000 years as I, John Barry, take you on a sizzling journey through their history and global impact. Peppers are more than just a culinary spice; they've been revered as medicinal wonders and ritualistic symbols by ancient civilizations like the Aztecs and Mayans. Learn how the once-mild peppers transformed into the fiery Apollo variety, now vying for the title of hottest pepper, and how the Scoville scale became the essential guide for spice enthusiasts everywhere. This episode promises flavorful tales and fiery facts, including a glimpse into my own adventures with peppers right here in Oklahoma.
From the Spanish and Portuguese explorers who first spread peppers across the globe to their central role in beloved cuisines like Indian and Chinese, peppers have conquered the world one dish at a time. Imagine relishing your favorite Mongolian barbecue with just the right level of heat, or discovering how these vibrant fruits have shaped dishes across continents. Whether you're a fan of fiery flavors or a curious culinary explorer, this episode offers a mouth-watering history lesson sprinkled with personal stories and a call for collaboration on my YouTube channel, celebrating November's National Pepper Month. Get ready to ignite your passion for peppers and join a global community of spice lovers.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
So today we're diving solo just me myself and I into
the spicy world of peppers.
Also, in November, it'sNational Pepper Month and we're
going to be doing acollaboration on my YouTube
channel.
In this video, towards the end,I'm going to tell you how you
can also create a video and joinin on the collaboration.
(00:23):
So thanks for joining me inthis bonus episode.
We're just going to talk alittle bit about the history of
the pepper, and I am just a fan.
There is very few days that goby to where I don't have a
pepper, whether it be atbreakfast, at lunch, at dinner.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Time to fire up that grill.
From smoked pork to smashburgers, outdoor cooking just
tastes better.
This is the Okie Smokin'Podcast, and here's your host,
John Barry.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Or maybe it's not a pepper, but it's some hot sauce
or some spiciness that a pepperhas been in.
Maybe it's some hot sauce orsome spiciness that a pepper has
been in, maybe it's some redpepper flakes, maybe it's some
kind of a powder that just kicksthings up just a little bit.
So the origin of peppers goesback to 6,000 years.
So, looking at the history ofthis, peppers have been around a
(01:42):
long time.
It's also believed that itoriginated in Central and South
America and then it was shownthat it was used for medicine.
It was used for rituals andthen eventually became a part of
(02:03):
the food scene.
It was also been used to treatcertain toothaches.
You know, you get you a, youthink about it and you have a
toothache and you could get youa pepper and put on there.
The pepper can help numb thattoothache and I don't know if it
could be the pain, it could bethe capsicum that is in that
(02:24):
pepper, but that is probably notthe case when you go way, way
back.
And the reason I say that is hewasn't necessarily that common
back then.
Most of these peppers were justmild.
It wasn't until later, whichwe'll get into here in a minute.
It wasn't until later that westarted to talk about the Scoble
(02:46):
unit.
I'll tell you who invented thatand what year that started to,
when we really started to havefun with Peppers.
To where it is today, to wherewe have every year some Pepper
coming out and they're trying tobreak the new Pepper Scoble
record.
Right now I believe the filmingof this video.
It is the, not the CarolinaReaper, but it's the Apollo
(03:10):
pepper that is the hottestpepper.
There could be another.
If you know, just comment below.
In whatever platform you'relistening to this episode in Let
me know and listening to thisepisode in Let me know, and I'm
sure there's going to be ahotter pepper.
(03:35):
Now, the peppers, like I said,were used for medicine.
They were also used for ritualsand they were also a cultural
significance for Aztecs.
For Mayans, peppers are weren'tjust food.
They used them for a healingand those types of things and
for, like I said, rituals.
(03:56):
They get in groups, they dothings together with these
peppers, as you would today withthe various types of items.
Now, later on, the pepper wasintroduced to Europe by the
Spanish and Portuguese explorersafter Columbus.
(04:16):
Now, after Columbus, after theydiscovered them in Europe, this
is when it started to go globaland it wasn't until this time.
Once it went there, it quicklyspread to Asia, to Africa and
then pretty much started to goworldwide.
Then you started to see thesecuisines and India curries and
(04:37):
China, which is you know howmany times do you see China
dishes?
They have a lot.
They really really celebratethe pepper whenever.
They use a lot of differentdishes in the Chinese cuisine.
So peppers is definitelysomething you're going to find
(04:58):
there.
You go into a Mongolian barbecueand they're going to say how
hot do you want it?
How spicy are you willing totake this dish?
And if it's me, you know therewas a restaurant that I went to.
I don't think it's still here.
We're from Oklahoma and thereused to be one and you would go
to a Mongolian barbecue, whichis you go up there and you get
(05:20):
all of your ingredients yourbroccoli, your celery, if you
want some kind of greens in it.
They also had these miniaturecorns and stuff.
There is still one in Norman,oklahoma, but you put all these
ingredients and then you putbeef, you put chicken or
(05:40):
whatever protein you want andthen the person will cook it.
They will ask you do you wantit spicy or not, and you can say
a little, a medium or a lot.
But there was one I rememberthat had like little clothespins
and you would put like oneclothespin, that meant little.
You'd put two clothespins,that'd mean a little hotter, and
(06:02):
you could put all the way up tolike five and if you put even
above two or three, it's hot.
You put five and it gets superhot.
So you've got to be carefulbecause you may not even be able
to eat that by the time they'redone.
But they really did get thefood involved after the Columbus
(06:23):
voyages, after it went out tothese chefs, to these food
experts and everything, and thenit wasn't just mostly for
medicine, it wasn't then nolonger just for cultural rituals
and those types of things.
Now there are plenty of peppervarieties as well and, as I said
(06:44):
, it wasn't until later theystarted to get the Scoville and
the Heat.
But currently the peppervarieties we have we're going to
start on the mild side is bellpeppers.
That's a mild, no heat.
You've also heard of bananapeppers.
Now you can get a banana pepperor you can get a mild and a hot
.
They have both of them.
(07:04):
I don't know of any bellpeppers that are hot.
If you do, let me know.
But you go from this this isMild to hotter.
Bell peppers is the mild side.
Jalapenos is a moderate heat.
For a lot of people they can behot and their Scoville units,
you know, usually about 5,000.
Then you've got habanero andscotch bonnets, which is these
(07:28):
are some of the hotter varieties.
They start adding intense heat.
They go great with fruit andflavor of the Caribbean.
They also are great on LatinAmerican dishes.
They really bring out theflavors and the heat on those
dishes.
You go up another level.
You're at ghost peppers.
These are some of the hottestpeppers and this is really where
(07:50):
most people tend to stop.
Only the crazy people go to,like Carolina Reapers or the
Apollo, and that's where youreally get the super hot.
There's also a scorpion andthere's some other peppers in
there.
There's Pepper X.
All these peppers are juststupid hot of 2 million to 3
million on the Scoville units.
(08:12):
But also note peppers areextremely healthy.
They're packed with vitamins.
They got vitamin A, vitamin C,antioxidants and capsaicin,
which is an anti-inflammatoryand metabolism boosting of your
properties, of your body.
So if you could have a pepper aday, like I love to do,
(08:35):
multiple peppers a day.
Sometimes it's actually goodfor your health.
But let's go ahead.
Before we talk about thecollaboration, let's talk just a
little bit about the Scovilleunit.
Now, the Scoville scale was notdeveloped until 1912.
It was by a pharmacist of thename Wilbur Scoville, and that's
(08:55):
where you get the name of theScoville scale.
The scale measures how spicythe peppers are by the amount of
capsicinoids that are in thepepper.
So it's pretty cool and you canactually get a meter.
I don't have one, I'd like tohave one to where you can
actually test how hot a pepperis, so you could see.
(09:18):
So if you grow your own peppers, you could actually compare and
see how hot each individualpepper is, if you pull it later,
if you pull it earlier, and howit grows up.
So pretty cool and somethingthat you can do.
So let me just go over some ofthe Scoble units.
Of course, I said the bellpepper's zero.
(09:40):
There is no heat at all.
Perfect for any dish, for kids,for anybody that don't like
heat.
Uh, perfectly fine, you couldmake you a salsa with it.
It'll taste great and will be100% mild.
Mark my word I don't believethere is any hot bell pepper.
I could be wrong.
And if it is, I wouldn't callit the bell pepper because it
(10:03):
would be something else.
It's not a bell pepper.
A bell pepper is not hot.
I told you earlier a jalapenois about 5,000.
Actually, look in here it's2,500 to 8,000.
I think about 5,000 is aboutaverage.
Sometimes you'll get one ofthose that you're like this is
one of the hotter ones.
You're close to that 8,000 markprobably.
(10:24):
Now that's moderate heat.
Your bell pepper zero heat, noheat, jalapeno, moderate heat.
Next you go to habanero.
This is a big jump, big big100,000 to over a quarter
million, actually 350,000 on theScoville unit.
(10:47):
And it has a nice fruityprofile.
Goes great with fruit items aswell, great in hot sauce.
I make a blueberry habanero hotsauce.
Mango's great with this hotsauce.
So it pairs well and is anexcellent fruit.
Love them.
They're kind of orange andexcellent but definitely hot.
(11:10):
An excellent, but definitelyhot.
Then you go to the ghost pepper,which is 800,000 to 1 million,
and we're not talking quite hot,we're going to say extremely
hot.
Um, this is where most peopleyou know kind of hang out if
they love heat, uh, ghost pepper.
(11:32):
But if you really Want to gocrazy, go to the Carolina Reaper
at 1.4 to 2.2 million Scovilleunits and a new Pepper out.
You don't hear much about it.
You have the Pepper X and nowyou have the Apollo, which
clocks in at over 3 million.
I think it may start closer.
(11:52):
The Carolina Reaper is 1.4 to2.2.
And the Apollo and some of them, hotter ones might start on
that lower end of around 1.4 to1.8.
I don't know the numbers, butthey do go up to and over 3
million.
So extremely hot, the Scoville.
Now let me go ahead and tell youabout our month of November.
(12:14):
So November is National PepperMonth.
I'm celebrating this by hostinga collaboration on my YouTube
channel.
You can find me at it'syoutubecom slash, at Okie Smokin
.
That is the YouTube channelwhere I will be posting this and
(12:34):
I would invite each and everyone of you to join.
And I would invite each andevery one of you to join.
Anyone that is a creator or hasnever created anything is
welcome to join thiscollaboration.
All you must do is simply goahead and create a video.
You can cook you something withthe peppers in it.
You can make a dish it don'tmatter, maybe it's a dessert, it
(12:57):
doesn't matter and you can usemild peppers, such as the bell
pepper, or you can use a hotpepper, such as the ghost pepper
, maybe two or three peppers.
Whatever you want to do, Makesure you post this video anytime
during the month that we'recelebrating the pepper, november
1st, all the way to the end,any day in the month, or you can
(13:20):
post two or three, simply addhashtag peppering it up.
Hashtag peppering it up to thetitle or description of the
video.
That way, when people searchthe hashtag after Google and
YouTube's algorithm determineswhat your video is about, you
(13:42):
will become in the list.
Also, send a link to me.
You can email me at john atokiesmokingcom.
You can send it to my Facebookpage or my YouTube page, any way
you want, and I'll add it to aplaylist.
So you you'll be on ourpeppering it up playlist.
This is going to be fun.
We've got a few people already.
(14:02):
I'm expected to start seeingvideos early on in the month.
I expect my first video to goout the first or second.
I'm going to be doing a fourpart series, so check that out.
Get ready for that, and that isjust.
We are a great way to celebratethe pepper.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Thank you for listening to the Okie Smokin'
Podcast.
Episodes drop every Monday.
Don't forget to follow thispodcast or you might miss out on
some delicious creations.
You can also find us on ourwebsite, okiesmokincom, and on
YouTube and other social mediaplatforms.
Until next time, keep firing upthat grill.
So today we're diving solo just me myself and I into
the spicy world of peppers.
Also, in November, it'sNational Pepper Month and we're
going to be doing acollaboration on my YouTube
channel.
In this video, towards the end,I'm going to tell you how you
can also create a video and joinin on the collaboration.
(00:23):
So thanks for joining me inthis bonus episode.
We're just going to talk alittle bit about the history of
the pepper, and I am just a fan.
There is very few days that goby to where I don't have a
pepper, whether it be atbreakfast, at lunch, at dinner.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
Time to fire up that grill.
From smoked pork to smashburgers, outdoor cooking just
tastes better.
This is the Okie Smokin'Podcast, and here's your host,
John Barry.
Speaker 1 (01:19):
Or maybe it's not a pepper, but it's some hot sauce
or some spiciness that a pepperhas been in.
Maybe it's some hot sauce orsome spiciness that a pepper has
been in, maybe it's some redpepper flakes, maybe it's some
kind of a powder that just kicksthings up just a little bit.
So the origin of peppers goesback to 6,000 years.
So, looking at the history ofthis, peppers have been around a
(01:42):
long time.
It's also believed that itoriginated in Central and South
America and then it was shownthat it was used for medicine.
It was used for rituals andthen eventually became a part of
(02:03):
the food scene.
It was also been used to treatcertain toothaches.
You know, you get you a, youthink about it and you have a
toothache and you could get youa pepper and put on there.
The pepper can help numb thattoothache and I don't know if it
could be the pain, it could bethe capsicum that is in that
(02:24):
pepper, but that is probably notthe case when you go way, way
back.
And the reason I say that is hewasn't necessarily that common
back then.
Most of these peppers were justmild.
It wasn't until later, whichwe'll get into here in a minute.
It wasn't until later that westarted to talk about the Scoble
(02:46):
unit.
I'll tell you who invented thatand what year that started to,
when we really started to havefun with Peppers.
To where it is today, to wherewe have every year some Pepper
coming out and they're trying tobreak the new Pepper Scoble
record.
Right now I believe the filmingof this video.
It is the, not the CarolinaReaper, but it's the Apollo
(03:10):
pepper that is the hottestpepper.
There could be another.
If you know, just comment below.
In whatever platform you'relistening to this episode in Let
me know and listening to thisepisode in Let me know, and I'm
sure there's going to be ahotter pepper.
(03:35):
Now, the peppers, like I said,were used for medicine.
They were also used for ritualsand they were also a cultural
significance for Aztecs.
For Mayans, peppers are weren'tjust food.
They used them for a healingand those types of things and
for, like I said, rituals.
(03:56):
They get in groups, they dothings together with these
peppers, as you would today withthe various types of items.
Now, later on, the pepper wasintroduced to Europe by the
Spanish and Portuguese explorersafter Columbus.
(04:16):
Now, after Columbus, after theydiscovered them in Europe, this
is when it started to go globaland it wasn't until this time.
Once it went there, it quicklyspread to Asia, to Africa and
then pretty much started to goworldwide.
Then you started to see thesecuisines and India curries and
(04:37):
China, which is you know howmany times do you see China
dishes?
They have a lot.
They really really celebratethe pepper whenever.
They use a lot of differentdishes in the Chinese cuisine.
So peppers is definitelysomething you're going to find
(04:58):
there.
You go into a Mongolian barbecueand they're going to say how
hot do you want it?
How spicy are you willing totake this dish?
And if it's me, you know therewas a restaurant that I went to.
I don't think it's still here.
We're from Oklahoma and thereused to be one and you would go
to a Mongolian barbecue, whichis you go up there and you get
(05:20):
all of your ingredients yourbroccoli, your celery, if you
want some kind of greens in it.
They also had these miniaturecorns and stuff.
There is still one in Norman,oklahoma, but you put all these
ingredients and then you putbeef, you put chicken or
(05:40):
whatever protein you want andthen the person will cook it.
They will ask you do you wantit spicy or not, and you can say
a little, a medium or a lot.
But there was one I rememberthat had like little clothespins
and you would put like oneclothespin, that meant little.
You'd put two clothespins,that'd mean a little hotter, and
(06:02):
you could put all the way up tolike five and if you put even
above two or three, it's hot.
You put five and it gets superhot.
So you've got to be carefulbecause you may not even be able
to eat that by the time they'redone.
But they really did get thefood involved after the Columbus
(06:23):
voyages, after it went out tothese chefs, to these food
experts and everything, and thenit wasn't just mostly for
medicine, it wasn't then nolonger just for cultural rituals
and those types of things.
Now there are plenty of peppervarieties as well and, as I said
(06:44):
, it wasn't until later theystarted to get the Scoville and
the Heat.
But currently the peppervarieties we have we're going to
start on the mild side is bellpeppers.
That's a mild, no heat.
You've also heard of bananapeppers.
Now you can get a banana pepperor you can get a mild and a hot
.
They have both of them.
(07:04):
I don't know of any bellpeppers that are hot.
If you do, let me know.
But you go from this this isMild to hotter.
Bell peppers is the mild side.
Jalapenos is a moderate heat.
For a lot of people they can behot and their Scoville units,
you know, usually about 5,000.
Then you've got habanero andscotch bonnets, which is these
(07:28):
are some of the hotter varieties.
They start adding intense heat.
They go great with fruit andflavor of the Caribbean.
They also are great on LatinAmerican dishes.
They really bring out theflavors and the heat on those
dishes.
You go up another level.
You're at ghost peppers.
These are some of the hottestpeppers and this is really where
(07:50):
most people tend to stop.
Only the crazy people go to,like Carolina Reapers or the
Apollo, and that's where youreally get the super hot.
There's also a scorpion andthere's some other peppers in
there.
There's Pepper X.
All these peppers are juststupid hot of 2 million to 3
million on the Scoville units.
(08:12):
But also note peppers areextremely healthy.
They're packed with vitamins.
They got vitamin A, vitamin C,antioxidants and capsaicin,
which is an anti-inflammatoryand metabolism boosting of your
properties, of your body.
So if you could have a pepper aday, like I love to do,
(08:35):
multiple peppers a day.
Sometimes it's actually goodfor your health.
But let's go ahead.
Before we talk about thecollaboration, let's talk just a
little bit about the Scovilleunit.
Now, the Scoville scale was notdeveloped until 1912.
It was by a pharmacist of thename Wilbur Scoville, and that's
(08:55):
where you get the name of theScoville scale.
The scale measures how spicythe peppers are by the amount of
capsicinoids that are in thepepper.
So it's pretty cool and you canactually get a meter.
I don't have one, I'd like tohave one to where you can
actually test how hot a pepperis, so you could see.
(09:18):
So if you grow your own peppers, you could actually compare and
see how hot each individualpepper is, if you pull it later,
if you pull it earlier, and howit grows up.
So pretty cool and somethingthat you can do.
So let me just go over some ofthe Scoble units.
Of course, I said the bellpepper's zero.
(09:40):
There is no heat at all.
Perfect for any dish, for kids,for anybody that don't like
heat.
Uh, perfectly fine, you couldmake you a salsa with it.
It'll taste great and will be100% mild.
Mark my word I don't believethere is any hot bell pepper.
I could be wrong.
And if it is, I wouldn't callit the bell pepper because it
(10:03):
would be something else.
It's not a bell pepper.
A bell pepper is not hot.
I told you earlier a jalapenois about 5,000.
Actually, look in here it's2,500 to 8,000.
I think about 5,000 is aboutaverage.
Sometimes you'll get one ofthose that you're like this is
one of the hotter ones.
You're close to that 8,000 markprobably.
(10:24):
Now that's moderate heat.
Your bell pepper zero heat, noheat, jalapeno, moderate heat.
Next you go to habanero.
This is a big jump, big big100,000 to over a quarter
million, actually 350,000 on theScoville unit.
(10:47):
And it has a nice fruityprofile.
Goes great with fruit items aswell, great in hot sauce.
I make a blueberry habanero hotsauce.
Mango's great with this hotsauce.
So it pairs well and is anexcellent fruit.
Love them.
They're kind of orange andexcellent but definitely hot.
(11:10):
An excellent, but definitelyhot.
Then you go to the ghost pepper,which is 800,000 to 1 million,
and we're not talking quite hot,we're going to say extremely
hot.
Um, this is where most peopleyou know kind of hang out if
they love heat, uh, ghost pepper.
(11:32):
But if you really Want to gocrazy, go to the Carolina Reaper
at 1.4 to 2.2 million Scovilleunits and a new Pepper out.
You don't hear much about it.
You have the Pepper X and nowyou have the Apollo, which
clocks in at over 3 million.
I think it may start closer.
(11:52):
The Carolina Reaper is 1.4 to2.2.
And the Apollo and some of them, hotter ones might start on
that lower end of around 1.4 to1.8.
I don't know the numbers, butthey do go up to and over 3
million.
So extremely hot, the Scoville.
Now let me go ahead and tell youabout our month of November.
(12:14):
So November is National PepperMonth.
I'm celebrating this by hostinga collaboration on my YouTube
channel.
You can find me at it'syoutubecom slash, at Okie Smokin
.
That is the YouTube channelwhere I will be posting this and
(12:34):
I would invite each and everyone of you to join.
And I would invite each andevery one of you to join.
Anyone that is a creator or hasnever created anything is
welcome to join thiscollaboration.
All you must do is simply goahead and create a video.
You can cook you something withthe peppers in it.
You can make a dish it don'tmatter, maybe it's a dessert, it
(12:57):
doesn't matter and you can usemild peppers, such as the bell
pepper, or you can use a hotpepper, such as the ghost pepper
, maybe two or three peppers.
Whatever you want to do, Makesure you post this video anytime
during the month that we'recelebrating the pepper, november
1st, all the way to the end,any day in the month, or you can
(13:20):
post two or three, simply addhashtag peppering it up.
Hashtag peppering it up to thetitle or description of the
video.
That way, when people searchthe hashtag after Google and
YouTube's algorithm determineswhat your video is about, you
(13:42):
will become in the list.
Also, send a link to me.
You can email me at john atokiesmokingcom.
You can send it to my Facebookpage or my YouTube page, any way
you want, and I'll add it to aplaylist.
So you you'll be on ourpeppering it up playlist.
This is going to be fun.
We've got a few people already.
(14:02):
I'm expected to start seeingvideos early on in the month.
I expect my first video to goout the first or second.
I'm going to be doing a fourpart series, so check that out.
Get ready for that, and that isjust.
We are a great way to celebratethe pepper.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Thank you for listening to the Okie Smokin'
Podcast.
Episodes drop every Monday.
Don't forget to follow thispodcast or you might miss out on
some delicious creations.
You can also find us on ourwebsite, okiesmokincom, and on
YouTube and other social mediaplatforms.
Until next time, keep firing upthat grill.
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