Spice Rating Determination

Rationale and Method

What is spicy hot to one person may be very tame to another person.  Other products on the market use subjective words such as hot, very hot, or blazing hot.  Some place images of chili peppers on their package to indicate some level of spiciness or ‘heat.’  In the final analysis, it is up to the consumer to determine his own level of heat tolerance.  At a minimum, the spice rating scale used on our retail products attempts to provide the consumer with a consistent relative descriptor of the heat level in our Spice Venture products. 

The Spice Rating appearing on our deli products is based upon the use of Chili Powder with a consistent 90000 Scoville Unit rating and a carefully controlled batch formulation.  

The table below shows the percent of 90,000 Scoville Units of Chili Powder used in each recipe at batch formulation.

The spice rating value used on our product labels is determined by multiplying the percentage of chili powder in our formulation by 1000 and multiplying the resulting value by .75  (i.e.:  % * 1000 * 0.75). 

Our own subjective taste tests confirm the relative consistency in our rating system among dishes in our product line with respect to heat.  The spice rating appearing on our product is intended as a consistent measure of heat content to alert the consumer that the product does contain some heat.  Consumers will subjectively form their own judgment based upon their own pain receptors as to how hot our product is to them.