From
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...hil08.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/05/08/ixhome.html
I like the bit about getting drunks out of his bar
"We live in an extreme world," explains Blair Lazar, a hot sauce creator. "And I make extreme foods.' In his hands is the hottest spice in the world, an ultra-refined version of chilli powder so fiery that customers must sign a waiver absolving him of any liability if they are foolish enough to try it.
Locked in a crystal flask sealed with wax and a tiny skull, Mr Lazar's mouth-blistering concoction is pure capsaicin - the chemical that lends habanero and jalapeno peppers their thermo nuclear heat.
His "16 Million Reserve", which is released to the public this week, is the holy grail of hot sauces, the hottest that chemistry can create.
It is 30 times hotter than the spiciest pepper, the Red Savina from Mexico, and 8,000 times stronger than Tabasco sauce. To put the tiniest speck on the tip of your tongue is to experience "pure heat", Mr Lazar says.
Although capsaicin does not actually burn - it fools your brain into thinking that you are in pain by stimulating nerve endings in your mouth - some medical experts believe that it could kill an asthmatic or hospitalise a user who touched his eyes or other sensitive parts of the anatomy.
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The eye-watering qualities of peppers are measured in internationally recognised Scoville units, developed by Wilbur Scoville, an American chemist who, in 1912, asked tasters to evaluate how many parts of sugar water it took to neutralise capsaicin heat.
Today, capsaicin content is measured in parts per million, using a process known as high-performance liquid chromatography; one part being equivalent to 15 Scoville units. Benign bell peppers rate zero Scoville units and the Red Savina entered Guinness World Records at 570,000 units.
Pure capsaicin, meanwhile, has a heat score of 16 million units - inspiring the name for Mr Lazar's latest creation. Each of the 999 limited-edition bottles, priced at $199 (£105), contains just a few crystals. The powder is so strong, however, that Mr Lazar estimates that it would have to be dissolved in 250,000 gallons of water before it could no longer be tasted.
His career as a hot sauce creator began when he found that the best way to clear drunks out of his seaside bar was to give them free chicken wings dipped in an eye-watering home-made hot sauce.