Sweet ‘n’ Spicy: NMSU Students Put The Heat In Brownies

They say opposites attract, and that may be true.

But chocolate with a kick of heat?

You may have never thought of adding chile pepper to your brownie mix, but some NMSU graduate students did. Now, one of the hottest peppers in the world is heating up a new batch on campus.

“Mmm, delicious,” one taste tester said.

Not knowing how hot it will be, daring samplers put the dessert to the test.

“Oh it’s got a ‘kick-Bhut ‘taste,” another taste tester said.

At first bite, it just tastes chocolate and moist, as one may expect in a brownie.

But a moment later, a burning sensation kicks in and the difference is distinct.

“It’s not too scary … oh, now it’s kickin’ in,” another taste tester said.

The spicy kick in the sweet dessert is powder from one of the hottest chile peppers in the world. It is known as the Bhut Jolokia.

“We just thought it would make a great brownie,” Denise Coon, program coordinator for the New Mexico Chile Pepper Institute, said.

Coon says grad students devised three explosive combinations — mild, medium and hot — a unique novelty giving taste buds quite a sensation.

“There seems to be this huge interest in these chile peppers termed as super-hot,” Coon said. “The Bhut Jolokia is one of these super-hot varieties people are just crazy about right now.”

The pepper starts off green and eventually ripens into a dark red. The hottest red form is what is being ground up and thrown into the brownie mix.

“When the heat hits you, it’s not overpowering but it’s definitely there,” another taste tester said.

“I think popular opinion has been toward the hotter versions, the medium and the hot,” said Sarah Padilla, an NMSU Food Science graduate student. “We’re just trying to gather which one’s the most popular, how often people would eat them if they bought them, and just gather positive feedback, and if people don’t like them, we also want to take that into consideration.”

The chile brownies will eventually be sold in the Chile Institute on campus.

“I’ve already gotten emails from people that know about the Chile Institute, know about the research NMSU does, that are out in Germany who are saying, as soon as this product comes out let us know because we want it,” Coon said.

More than 300 samples will be given out during the project.

Taste testing continues Thursday in the Gerald Thomas Hall, room 331. But taste testers recommend, come prepared with a cold glass of milk.

“I could eat this every opportunity I have,” another woman said.