All over the world, almost every county have at least one or two dish that are spicy and most of the time chili pepper is the common ingredient used to spice the heat up of a dish. Although there are some countries that greatly puts emphasis on spicy dishes as their signature dish as compared to other countries where spice is toned down a bit. Each country has its own spicy yet delicious dishes. For today’s post, we have gathered some of the spiciest cuisines in the world.
Spiciest Cuisine In The World
Spicy cuisines that ranges from stews to soups to vegetables and to meat, not only are these dishes the spiciest food but are popular as well. You can either find this delicious and spicy food in restaurants but you can all make your own at the comfort of home.
Nigerian Cuisine
In Nigeria, most of their dishes includes different varieties of peppers to add heat such as Shombo or Chili pepper and Rodo or Scotch Bonnet peppers. The difference between Nigerian cuisine and other cuisines in the world is that almost all foods in Nigeria are spicy.
Suya is a well known spicy food in Nigeria. This spicy grilled kebab is made of skewered meat either beef, ram or chicken. The innards of the animals are also used such as the liver and kidneys. Another popular spicy food in Nigeria is the Ofada Stew. It is spiced with Rodo Peppers.
Aside from spicy dishes, Nigeria is also known for making extremely spicy condiments and sauce such as ata din din (Nigerian peppers sauce) made from Shombo pepper or Rodo Pepper, with onions and salt. Another spicy sauce is called Agoyin sauce that is made with Rodo Peppers and Shombo Peppers as well. These sauces are extremely spicy.
South Africa Cuisine
Foods in South Africa are highly influenced by India where different spices are brought from India and introduced in South African cuisine.
Some of the most commonly used ingredients in South African cooking includes cilantro leaves (coriander), hot chili peppers, black pepper, salt, garlic and spices.
An example of a spicy dish in South Africa is the Biltong. These are thinly-sliced meat (beef) that are cured in salt, vinegar and different varieties of spices such as pepper and coriander. Another spicy food in South African Cuisine is the Capa Malay Curry is made from cinnamon, chili and turmeric. Not to mention Chakalaka which is a spicy vegetable dish in the country.
Bunny Chow is South Africa’s national street food. It is a bread with spicy curry as fillings. Fillings are made by mixing vegetables, mutton and chicken curry.
Chinese Cuisine
Before the year 1570, China do not use hot peppers or there were no Chili peppers in the country but rather used Sichuan peppercorn and ginger instead to add to the dish to make it spicy for Sichuan Cuisine. Sichuan Peppercorns when added to Chinese dishes is what’s causing the mouth to feel that numbing sensation.
Some of the spiciest foods in China are dan dan noodles, gan gou, Kung pow Chicken, Gan Bao Chicken, Kashgar Kebabs, Suan Cai Yu, Mapo Dofu or Tofu and we also have the saliva chicken. Most of these dishes uses Sichuan peppercorns as well as hot chili peppers.
USA cuisine
In the US, specifically in the Northern States in which there is a wide selection of spicy foods commonly seen in Tex-Mex (Texas-Mexican food) cuisine that mostly use chilies on their dishes such as Jalapenos and Chipotle.
Tex-Mex foods includes but not limited to Enchiladas, Jalapeno stuffed beef burger and chili con carne. There are also Cajun Cuisine and Creole cuisines but the dishes are not actually based on chilies but most of the dishes are incorporated with cayenne peppers for extra heat.
A popular spicy food in the US is the Buffalo Wings and spice. It is also called hot wings. These are spicy chicken wings that were seasoned and then deep fried. An original hot wings dish is not actually breaded but it is tossed in a extremely spicy sauce and is usually served with blue cheese and celery.
Most of the restaurants in the United States diners have an option to adjust the level of spiciness they want for their hot wings but there are those who uses either Ghost peppers or Carolina Reapers sauce to their hot wings.
The US is known to be the home of Carolina Reaper, the most hottest peppers in the entire planet. As a matter of fact, it is noted that Carolina Reaper is more than 200 times more spicy than Jalapenos. and even twice as hot and spicy than Ghost Peppers.
Indian Cuisine
India has different cultures and and each culture has its own version of spicy dishes and Indian Curries. Dishes in India usually consists of vegetables and meat that are usually cooked in a spicy sauce that varies in the level of spice ranging from mild to extremely spicy.
With Indian foods the more the chilies are added to the dish, the more spicier a dish will be especially with spicy curries.
The most famous Indian dishes such as curries are Madras and the Jalfrezi. Madras uses large amounts of garam masala, chili powder and cumin while Jalfrezi is a onion-based Indian dishes with more chillies used too.
Ethiopian cuisine
The most common spices used in Ethiopian foods to make it spicy includes chili powder, garlic and ginger. Although there are some Ethiopian dishes that uses the Berbere spice as the base of their dishes.
Ethiopian Beef Tibs is an Ethiopian dish that is made by stir frying and stewing with added ingredients such as butter and vegetables. To turn up the heat of this dish, spices such as cumin, cloves, ginger and chillies are added.
Another spicy dish in Ethiopia is Wat, a curry or stew that is made with beef, lamb and chicken. Additional ingredients includes spices, vegetables and butter.
Indonesian Cuisine
No wonder Indonesian Cuisine belong to the spiciest cuisine in the world as the well-known Spice Islands is located on the eastern part of Indonesia.
The most famous spiciest food in Indonesia is called Rendang. It has spread to other Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore, Brunei, Malaysia and Singapore. Rendang is a meat dish that is mixed with different herbs and spices such as star anise, cloves and cardamom.
Another spicy food in Indonesia is the Bekek Madura. It is more spicy than Rendang. It is made of duck meat that is seasoned with different varieties of pepper, chillies and peppers.
The most spiciest Indonesian dish is the Seblak, an Indonesian Street food with extremely spicy both made of shallots, garlic, garlic and Chili.
Malaysian Cuisine
Malaysian Cuisine also has its fairly amount of dishes that are considerably spicy. Other cuisines such as Malay Cuisine, Chinese Cuisine and Indian cuisines greatly inspires cuisines of Malaysia.
A well known spicy chili paste called Sambal Belacan is used in most of Malay dishes. Meats and seafoods are usually added with different varieties of herbs such as turmeric, galangal, laksa leaves and ginger.
The national dish of Malaysia is called Nasi Lemak it is made by cooking the fragrant rice in coconut milk and Pandan leaves. Usually served with sambal, which is a spicy paste, along with anchovies and eggs.
Thailand Cuisine
Many of the dishes in Thailand contains if not one but several spice ingredients to make it hot and spicy. Thailand dishes are mostly spicy, although most of the dishes are not that spicy but rather mild and the level of spiciness have been toned down.
In Thailand, different varieties of chilies are abundant in the country because it is grown there. Spices such as peppercorn, garlic, and ginger that are commonly used in Thai restaurants.
The popular spicy food in Thailand is the Kua Kling, a spicy dry curry that is made with minced pork and Southern Thai-style curry paste. The curry paste is made from turmeric, Thailand’s dry chillies, galangal and garlic.
Another spicy food in Thailand is Tom Yum. A sour and spicy soup that contains bird’s eye pepper, kaffir lime leaves, lemongrass, lime juice, galangal and fish sauce.
Mexican Cuisine
In Mexican Cuisine, Chili peppers is the most commonly used ingredient. There are almost more than a hundred different varieties of Chili peppers in the country. Each variety has its own level of spiciness, different shapes and sizes with different color variations as well.
Most of the dishes in Mexico usually use at least one chili pepper. Other chili pepper variety includes the chipotle/Jalapeno, serrano, guajillo, mulato and pasilla.
Popular Mexican dishes such as burritos, fajitas and enchiladas are usually added spice to make it spicy, though you can also eat them as non-spicy snack or foods.
Mexicans can very well tolerate spicy foods, as a matter of fact spicy peppers are often consumed by the locals of different classes in the country.
Korean Cuisine
Most Koreans prefer to eat spicy hot dishes. The red chili paste that is added to most Korean dishes is what’s making Korean dishes spicy. Red Chili paste is a fermented paste made from Napa Cabbage. Bibibamp is an example of a spicy food in Korea. It is made from mixing meat and vegetables.
In Korean cooking, chilis that are usually used are Green Chilies, Gochu-Jangajji (pickled chilies) and Gochujeon (Green chile pancake).
Japanese Cuisine
Shishito peppers SHU (Scoville heat units) ranges between 100 to 1,000. These are peppers used in Japanese cooking that is considered to be mildly hot.
High amounts are added to other Japanese dishes such as the spicy miso ramen. It can be either in a form of red chile oi.
Sichimi on the other hand is a Japanese spice containing seven ingredients: chili powder, szechuan pepper or sansho, black sesame or poppy seeds, citrus powder, ginger powder, white sesame and citrus powder.