Dating back as far as 7,000 BC, evidence of the consumption of peppers have been found by archeologists. Nearly 9,000 years later peppers are still a very relevant ingredient within a variety of cultural dishes, and hot sauces today. Over the duration of time, thousands of peppers have been discovered and grown throughout the globe. Although a select few of those peppers are most prominent in the culinary world today, one of those being the chili

Pepper. Used as a seasoning, chili peppers have a wide variety of influence within multiple types of sauces. These sauces can vary from mild to hot all depending on the types of chili peppers within the sauce and the dilution of the peppers.

A way to measure this variance is the Scoville scale. This scale is how the heat and spiciness of anything derived from the chili pepper are measured. In 1912 an American pharmacist by the name of Wilbur L. Scoville established the Scoville Organoleptic Test more commonly known today as the Scoville scale. Wilbur was able to derive this scale from inducing pain with capsaicin, which is the chemical in peppers responsible for the spiciness sensation. He would then question the subjects after the test.

Throughout many tests and studies, the Scoville scale came into existence. Today this scale has been tweaked more based off of High-Pressure Liquid Chromatography (HPLC),  which produces much more accurate results than the measurement of human senses. HPLC can separate a mixture of compounds, therefore, allowing scientist to determine the heat of a pepper by studying its makeup. Scientist today have used this method to determine some of the hottest peppers in the world. Each pepper in its natural form has a measurement in Scoville Heat Units (SHU). Certain peppers are significantly hotter than others.

The Carolina Reaper finds itself at the top of the list for the world's hottest chili pepper at an astonishing 2,200,000 SHU. To put this into perspective the Carolina Reaper is about 300 times hotter than some of the hottest jalapenos. Carolina Reapers are also hotter than mase,  the spray used by police which is around 575,000 SHU, and the most common mouth burning hot sauces which use habanero peppers that come in around 300,000 SHU. The capsaicin within the Carolina Reaper causes a wave of temperature change within the brain and mouth which eventually lead up to a very intense burning sensation caused by reacting nerves. The burning sensation can last up to 20 minutes but the digestive pain can last from about 2 hours to 5 hours and even more depending on the number of peppers consumed. However,  the Carolina Reaper is not the hottest pepper substance there is.

Many different sauces have been constructed that feature extracted capsaicin from multiple different peppers some of these sauces are reaching upwards of 10,000,000 SCH. Every year there is usually a race to create the hottest sauces known to mankind while remaining edible and possibly flavorful. The hottest of the hot are made with precise science and knowledge of how different pepper extracts work together to create extremely hot substances. Overall hot sauces are a great way to add flavor to your favorite dish or to prove your braveness by trying some of the hottest sauce known to man.