Bird's eye chili or Thai chili (Thai: ''prik ki nu'', พริกขี้หนู, literally "mouse dung chili" owing to its shape) is a chili pepper, a variety from the species '' Capsicum annuum'' native to Mexico. Cultivated across Southeast Asia, it is used extensively in many Asian cuisines. It may be mistaken for a similar-looking chili derived from the species '' Capsicum frutescens'', the cultivar " siling labuyo". ''Capsicum frutescens'' fruits are generally smaller and characteristically point upwards.

Description

The bird's eye chili plant is a perennial with small, tapering fruits, often two or three, at a node. The fruits are very pungent. The bird's eye chili is small, but is quite hot. It measures around 100,000 - 225,000 Scoville units, which is at the lower half of the range for the hotter

habanero The habanero (; ) is a hot variety of chili. Unripe habaneros are green, and they color as they mature. The most common color variants are orange and red, but the fruit may also be white, brown, yellow, green, or purple. Typically, a ripe haba ...

, but still much hotter than a common jalapeño. Phơi ớt hiểm

Origins

All chilis found around the world today have their origins in Mexico, Central America, and South America. They were spread by Spanish and Portuguese colonists, missionaries, and traders, together with many other now common crops such as maize, tomatoes and pineapples through the

Columbian Exchange The Columbian exchange, also known as the Columbian interchange, was the widespread transfer of plants, animals, precious metals, commodities, culture, human populations, technology, diseases, and ideas between the New World (the Americas) in ...

. The chili varieties found in Southeast Asia today were brought there in the 16th or 17th century.

Uses by humans

As food

Indonesian cuisine Indonesian cuisine is a collection of various regional culinary traditions that formed the archipelagic nation of Indonesia. There are a wide variety of recipes and cuisines in part because Indonesia is composed of approximately 6,000 popula ...

, these chilis are widely used in a variety of dishes and sambals. In Vietnamese cuisine, these chilis are used in soups, salads, and stir-fried dishes. They are also put in a wide variety of sauces, pastes, and marinades, used as a condiment or eaten raw, both fresh and dried. In Thai cuisine, these chilis are highly valued for their fruity taste and extreme spiciness. They are extensively used in many Thai dishes, such as in

Thai curries Thai curry ( th, แกง, translit=kaeng, ) is a dish in Thai cuisine made from curry paste, coconut milk or water, meat, seafood, vegetables or fruit, and herbs. Curries in Thailand mainly differ from the curries in India in their use of ingr ...

and in Thai salads, green as well as the ripe red chilis; or they can just be eaten raw on the side, with for instance, '' khao kha mu'' (stewed pork trotter served with rice).

As ornamentals

The more decorative, but slightly less pungent chili, sometimes known as "Thai ornamental", has peppers that point upward on the plant, and range from green to yellow, orange, and then red. It is the basis for the hybrid cultivar "

Numex twilight The Chile Pepper Institute at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, New Mexico, is an international research-based and non-profit organization specializing in research, education and archiving information related to ''Capsicum'' or chile p ...

", essentially the same, but less pungent, and starting with purple fruit, creating a rainbow effect. These peppers can grow wild in places such as

Saipan Saipan ( ch, Sa’ipan, cal, Seipél, formerly in es, Saipán, and in ja, 彩帆島, Saipan-tō) is the largest island of the Northern Mariana Islands, a Commonwealth (U.S. insular area), commonwealth of the United States in the western Pa ...

and Guam.

References