Chilipepper Tip of the Day

I recently made chili for a luncheon here at work and I wanted to try out Steph’s award-winning recipe. This requires chopping up many kinds of peppers--hot, mild, all kinds. Steph warned me to make sure I wore latex gloves when handling the peppers. I don’t know whether I thought she was wimpy or I wanted to try to be macho, but I scoffed at the rubber gloves and went on chopping the peppers, handling them only with the tips of my fingers. So it appears that I did take note of the warning, at least enough to take care in not smearing the pepper oil all over my hands. All went well and was successful, no burning hands afterward. I felt no ill effects from the peppers until the next morning, when I put my contacts in and experienced the worst burning in my life. I could barely pry my eyes open to get my contacts out of my watery, red eyes. My only reasoning regarding the burn was pepper oil. So again, I learn the hard way and tell you all--use gloves when chopping peppers…if your hands won’t thank you your eyes will!

-Jen