How to Build a Hot Sauce Heat Ladder at Home

You do not start a mountain at the top, and you should not start hot sauce there either.

A heat ladder is the simplest way to find out how much you actually like heat and how much you just like saying so. It is also a very good excuse to have friends over. Here is how to set one up without ruining anyone’s week.

What you need

Five sauces, ranked from gentle to serious. Buy from a good local shop if you can and ask what they would put at each rung.
Plain tortilla chips or fries. You want something neutral that carries the sauce.
Whole milk or sour cream, on the table from the start. Dairy helps with the burn. Water mostly moves it around.
A pen and paper for scores.

How the ladder works

Rung one: flavor. A mild pepper sauce. Notice the fruit, the vinegar and the salt.
Rung two: warm. A cayenne or jalapeño sauce. You feel it, but you can still talk.
Rung three: awake. Habanero territory. Conversation gets shorter.
Rung four: honest. Ghost pepper level. People start making promises.
Rung five: the bad idea. The bottle with the skull on it. Optional, and there is no shame in stopping.

Use one small dab each round, and wait three minutes between rungs. The heat builds, and most of the bravado happens in minute one.

Scoring

Rate each sauce twice, flavor and heat, one to five. The fun part is seeing how often the best-tasting bottle is rung three, not rung five. Heat is easy. Flavor at heat is hard.

The house rules

Nobody is pressured. If you tap out, you are the judge now.
Wash your hands before you touch your eyes or anything else you value. Then wash them again.
Skip it if spicy food does not agree with you or your doctor has told you to avoid it. The ladder will still be funny to watch.

What to do with the leftovers

Rung two goes in eggs. Rung three goes in chili. Rung four goes on wings if you are confident in your plumbing. Rung five goes in the back of the fridge, where it will outlive us all.

If you enjoyed that, the Mild Is a Four-Letter Word tee was made for you. If you did not, we respect it, and we also have a very good blanket.