I have seen the hotness of peppers vary *greatly* between the same species in the same garden, and even on the same plant. How do restaurants and other food preparers manage to get a product with consistent hotness?

Question

I have seen the hotness of peppers vary *greatly* between the same species in the same garden, and even on the same plant. How do restaurants and other food preparers manage to get a product with consistent hotness?

In: 1743

Answer 1

If it’s an individual element, you taste it.

As a chef you are sampling the product constantly. It’s drilled into you at culinary school to taste everything. The little pockets on our aprons are for tasting spoons and thermometers.

When you are dealing with volume, which is often the case, you sample a few but the sheer quanity balances out heat level. Then you taste it again.

For commercial or industrial food prep, vendors have some quality control at a macro level. They taste/inspect every X number of pallets before processing. However, processing averages out heat level as well.