Carolina Reaper: what is the hottest potato chip in the world (which put Fedez and Cattelan to the test)

«Uan almost metaphysical experience»he swore and perjured “by all the gods you can believe in” Alessandro Cattelan today on Radio Deejay. Something traumatic, Fedez echoed in his stories about him, in which he says he almost had to call an ambulance, having everything confirmed by Chiara Ferragni. It’s time to ask yourself what the hell happened yesterday at Cattelan’s tonightthe most irreverent late night show on Italian television. A joke, which however seems to have gotten slightly out of hand to the two protagonists, Alessandro Cattelan and Fedez. The idea was to conduct the second interview the format of «Hot Ones», which provides, question after question, to intersperse the answers with a taste of chili pepperslowly climbing the steps of the «Scala di Scoville» , the international unit of measurement for spiciness.

So it was and so, pepper after pepper, Fedez continued to answer Cattelan’s questions, in an amusing crescendo of shining eyes, difficulty of locution and nice jokes thrown here and there. Until the last taste, the most feared one, which put both the conductor and the singer to the test. The one from the Carolina Reaper.

What is the Carolina Reaper

“Fear the Reaper” is written on the wrapper of the deadliest potato chip in the world, which is sold individually in a coffin-shaped package (complete with latex gloves to avoid contact with the hands). It’s about a Carolina Reaper flavored potato chip precisely, a cultivar of chilli belonging to the «Capsicum chinense» species, entered in the Guinness World Record asand the hottest pepper in the world, reaching a level of 1,569,300 Scoville units, with peaks exceeding two million. For comparison, the Habanero, a very hot pepper typical of Yucatán, usually has between 100 and 350,000. Speaking of Guinness World Records, among other things, one cannot fail to mention the Californian Gregory Foster, who managed to eat ten chili peppers in September 2002 Carolina Reaper in just over thirty-three seconds. Probably, he will have succeeded by lining his mouth with wax, like dear old Homer Simpson, at least judging by the effect that the very spicy potato chip had on Cattelan and Fedez. The interview continued as expected, but the two appeared seriously tried. “But what happens if I vomit?” Fedez said in the broadcast, making it visibly difficult to keep talking, despite a few sips of milk, which should have tempered the spiciness. “I have a problem: if I breathe it hurts,” said Cattelan, later admitting today that he ran to the pharmacy after the program to buy an anti-reflux. Fedez, on the other hand, confessed in his stories that he was so ill once he got home that he seriously feared ending up in hospital.

«If you want to challenge friends, go ahead and buy it», concluded Cattelan, premising that the important thing is to be aware that the experience will not be pleasant. “But never ever give it to someone unknowing as a joke.”