Staff weirdo tries world's hottest hot sauce
Staff weirdo tries world’s hottest hot sauce
By Takashi Mochizuki
When I put a needlepoint amount of sauce on my tongue, extreme heat spread through my body in 1/100 of a second. It paralyzed my tongue and stole moisture from my throat. I realized my body was all sweat and my pores were wide-open. I screamed, but did not create enough air to produce sound. five friends were laughing at me, but I paid no attention. My brain scrambled to drink water. About one gallon of water allowed me to make my first comment about the sauce: it was painful.
Good news for hot food maniacs-this sauce throws you far into the hot zone, close to the point where the human body can no longer maintain its bodily functions.
You might think I am exaggerating, but when Jared Harmon, the Rift editor, tasted the same amount of sauce, he drank every drinkable liquid on the table. David Calvert, our managing editor, cried.
“Oh shit, this stuff is awful,” Calvert said holding a two-and-a-half gallon water bottle.
My first encounter with the hot sauce, Blair’s 3 a.m. Reserve, was on the Internet. I stumbled upon some review sites. The tasters said they suffered from a burning throat, eye pain and a burning rectum because of reckless sauce use.
According to Blair’s Sauces and Snacks, Chief Chillihead Blair Lazar, 35, originally operated a bar restaurant in New Jersey. When one drunk asked him to cook the hottest thing ever, he served the drunk chicken wings with hot sauce in 1991. Then he watched the drunk “light up like a candle, run to the men’s room and cry.”
The 2 a.m. Reserve, the first sauce in the product line, was made in 1997. The name is originated in the days when he was a bar owner.
“Two a.m. was the bar closing time and I used it as a way to get the drunks to leave the bar,” Lazar said. ” Six a.m. was the time I went to bed after cleaning his bar.”
The bottle comes with a beautiful, but eerie cap embedded with a skull.
“(I) designed it and the skull on the cap signifies ‘death’ brand,” Lazar said. “I love spicy foods and I love to make people feel alive with my products. I want my customers to have fun using my products. Chili is not a hobby, it is my life.”
A warning seal on the box said: “Use extreme caution. Avoid any skin contact. One table spoon of Blair’s 3 a.m. Reserve in one gallon of sauce will produce extreme heat.” Moreover, purchasers must agree to the liability waiver to buy it. Also, the company recommends wearing plastic gloves and having a fire extinguisher ready when handling the sauce.
One real caution-do not handle the sauce with your naked hands. I touched the sauce directly and washed my hands with every soap available in my home-detergent, body soap and face wash-for at least 20 minutes. Then, I made a mistake. I tried to take my contact lens off but the sauce still persisted and transferred the heat to my eyeballs. My eyes became red as heat spread all over my face. I was afraid I would lose my eyesight. My eyes were OK after rinsing them with running water for 40 minutes, but wash your hands well with lemon drops or milk if you touch it directly.
Blair’s Sauces and Snacks said their products in their concentrated form should not be used as a sauce because it might damage organs if improperly handled.
Blair’s 3 a.m. Reserve is made from natural extract from peppers such as habanero, making the sauce the fifth hottest sauce in the world. The company said that the sauce is about 1,000 times hotter than Tabasco.
The Blair’s 3 a.m. Reserve could be a deadly poison if you use it as I did. However, it gives food a twist if used properly. The sauce adds no extra taste as other hot sauces do. I made Chinese food with the sauce, and it rocked-the taste was the same as I always cook, but it was spicier.
The Blair’s a.m. Reserve series has 5 collections: 2 a.m. Reserve, to 6 a.m. Reserve. Six a.m. Reserve is the hottest sauce known in the world-about 50,000 times hotter than Tabasco. Because of the slow production process, only 999 bottles of 4 a.m., 5 a.m. and 6 a.m. Reserve were made.
Lazar said they limit the production not because they love to add premier value to their products.
“The ingredients are all natural,” Lazar said. “We limit the number of production because it needs special care and time. We make the concentration stronger and stronger by the amount of time that the pepper is cooking and the water is evaporating until we have a more pure concentrate.”
Six a.m. Reserve is almost sold out, and 4 a.m. and 5 a.m. Reserves are already sold out. Four a.m. and 5 a.m. Reserves are priced at about $4,000 on online auction sites. Six a.m. Reserve is available at Blair’s Sauces and Snacks for $150.
According to Lazar, he is developing two new reserves which will be hotter than 6 a.m. Reserve. One of them is called Halloween Reserve.
“I will produce only 99 bottles of Halloween Reserve,” Lazar said. The new reserve is sold for $99.
“One of the two is so crazy,” Lazar said. “I am trying to find a suitable container so I can safely ship this stuff.”
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