How to Make Chili Hotter Without Ruining It

Chili cook-off and tailgate season has one rule for making a pot hotter: pepper extract goes in last, one drop at a time, and you taste before you add more. More peppers change how your chili tastes. Extract changes only the heat. Here is how to get it right the first time.

Why extract beats more peppers

Fresh and dried peppers bring flavor, texture and heat all at once. Add enough superhots to make a pot truly hot and you have changed how it tastes, too. Extract separates the heat from everything else. You build the chili you want, then set the heat exactly where you want it.

It also measures. Our Special Edition extracts are made with HPLC-certified capsicum, the lab test that measures heat, so the number on the bottle is the heat in the bottle.

How much extract per pot

For scale, a jalapeño runs about 5,000 Scoville. Everything below starts at 200 times that.

These are starting points from the dilution reference in our full guide to cooking with pepper extract. Taste and adjust. Making a single bowl? Use a pinhead drop of 1 million, or a toothpick dab of anything hotter.

New to extract? Start with Revenge. It's 1,000,000 Scoville of habanero and chile pepper extract, and habanero heat is bright and fast, which suits a pot of chili. It takes over 12 pounds of hot peppers to make, and there's a reason the label is bright yellow. Two drops of Revenge and one of Plutonium No. 9 is the base of our own Chilihead's Chili.

The method, step by step

1. Finish the chili first. Season it, simmer it, get the flavor right at normal heat. Extract is the final adjustment, not an ingredient you build on.
2. Warm the bottle first. Our extracts are thick at room temperature, and the hottest are close to solid: Plutonium No. 9 is 60% pure capsicum. Stand the capped bottle in a mug of hot water until it loosens. The labels call for 140°F (60°C).
3. Add it in the last 5 minutes of cook time. One drop at a time, stirred into the pot, never onto a plate or a spoon.
4. Stir for at least 30 seconds. Then let it simmer a few minutes so the heat spreads through the whole pot. Skip this and you get hot spots.
5. Wait 60–90 seconds before you judge it. That is how long the heat takes to fully bloom. Taste from a clean spoon.
6. Repeat only if you need to. Another drop, stir, wait, taste. You can always add heat. You can't take it out.

Cooking for a crowd? Split the pot

Most people at a cook-off or tailgate don't want million-Scoville chili. Make one pot for everyone, ladle half into a second pot, and dose only that one. Mark it; a bandana on the handle works. Everyone eats, and the heat-seekers get the real thing.

Handle it like what it is

Pepper extract is a food additive, not something to eat straight. The labels on our 2 million to 9 million extracts say exactly that: do not consume directly.

• Wear gloves when dosing, especially with the solid extracts.
• Keep your hands away from your eyes and face until you have washed them.
• Keep bottles away from kids and pets. Extract is a kitchen ingredient, not a table condiment.
• Keep dairy nearby when tasting. Whole milk or yogurt cuts the burn better than water.
• Overshot the pot? Double the recipe without extract and combine. For the burn itself, see Too Much Hot Sauce? How to Stop the Burn.

Three chili recipes to try it on

• The Chilihead's Chili — 2 drops of Revenge plus 1 drop of Plutonium No. 9
• Drunken Fiery Veggie Chili
• Scraps and Scoville Black Bean Chili

Pick your number

New to extract, start with Revenge at 1 million. Ready for more, the Special Editions climb from there: Midnight Special at 2 million, 38 Special at 3 million and 44 Magnum at 4 million. Plutonium No. 9 is for when you know exactly what 9 million means. Nothing mild here.