Hot peppers add spice and flavor to many of your favorite dishes, but they can add a burning sensation to your skin. Peppers' "hotness" is based on the Scoville Heat Index. The fiery hot sensation in peppers is due to the substance capsaicin. Sweet bell peppers and cherry peppers are at the bottom of the scale and rarely cause a burning sensation. However, implement several safety precautions when cooking with hot peppers such as cayenne, habanero or the Scotch bonnet chili.
Step 1
Wear latex gloves when harvesting or cooking hot peppers. Use latex gloves; if you have a latex allergy opt for nitrile or vinyl gloves.
Step 2
Do not touch your eyes, mouth or nose when working with hot peppers. Wear safety glasses to avoid pepper juice entering your eyes. Always wash hands with soap and water immediately after handling peppers to avoid capsaicin burns.
Step 3
Cover your hands with a dairy product such as yogurt or sour cream before cooking with hot peppers. Dairy products contain casein, which counteracts the heat of capsaicin.
Step 4
Drink milk or eat ice cream if you ate a pepper too hot for you. Water won't put out the fire in your mouth.
Step 5
Coat the skin with rubbing alcohol to prevent skin from burning when coming in contact with hot peppers, suggests JalapenoMadness. Coat your skin with milk if available or thoroughly wash your skin with soap and water. Rinse your eyes with water or saline only. Rub vegetable or olive oil on the skin and then rinse.
Tips and Warnings
- The Scoville heat index was created in the early 1900s. It measures the amount of capsaicin in a hot pepper. Scoville units range from 0 to 300,000. Pure capsaicin is roughly 16 million Scoville units, according to the University of Wisconsin. The hottest pepper in the world is the Bhut Jolokia, commonly referred to as the ghost pepper. The pepper has 1 million Scoville units.
Things You'll Need
- Disposable gloves
- Safety glasses
- Soap
- Water
- Dairy product
- Rubbing alcohol
- Vegetable or olive oil
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