Fresh chillies and chilli powder

[Jonny69]

I have a question about chilli powder hotness. A lot of recipes suggest using a lot more chilli than I am comfortable with. I like my food pretty damn hot and I have quite a high tolerance of hot food but...

Take Lozza's lime pickle recipe (http://www.boat-drinks.co.uk/showthread.php?t=13016). If I used 5 teaspoons of my chilli powder it would be inedible so I've used 1 teaspoon and it's blow your head off hot. I wouldn't even put that much in a curry or chilli con carne to feed 6 because I know it would be way too hot. Jamie Oliver recipes often say to stick a few chillies in pasta, but it would be so hot it would obliterate all other flavours if I did that. Some of the curry recipes I have say to use 10-20 whole chillies plus dried but it's on the point of unbearable with a killer ring of fire if I use one whole fresh chilli and less than a teaspoon of dried.

Am I getting much hotter chilli than they are or am I just actually a weed with a sensitive sphincter? :shocked:

[SidewinderINC]

You'll find that "chilli powder" is more of a blend of spices for making something like a chili con carne. As such the different heat levels are about the proportions of the actual chili powder within it (if that makes sense)

If a recipe asks for chilli powder I usually add Cayenne powder, as that will usually be of the same heat level across different brands.

I'm a big fan of cooking with scotch bonnets, and I've often put a couple in a curry and found it quite pleasant to eat.
Then I've put in a couple of my own dried Thai chilis in another curry and it's been insanely hot - when technically speaking the scotch bonnets are way hotter.

Sorry if what I've just said is nothing new :p