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From
October 3, 2007
Shoppers dive for cover as chef’s eyewatering chilli sauce causes a terror alert
For three hours a mysterious cloud of acrid smoke hovered over some of London’s busiest streets. As shoppers ran coughing and spluttering for cover, police sealed off three roads and evacuated homes and businesses in the heart of Soho, fearing a chemical attack or a dangerous toxic leak.
As the ambulance service sent in its Hazardous Area Response Team Unit, firefighters wearing specialist breathing apparatus entered the deserted streets to seek out the source.
Soon after 7pm on Monday they emerged from the smoke carrying a huge cooking pot containing about 9lb of smouldering dried chillies.
The firefighters had smashed down the door of the Thai Cottage restaurant in D’Arblay Street and seized the extra-hot bird’s eye chillies which had been left dry-frying. They were being prepared as part of a six-month batch of nam prik pao, a super-hot Thai dip to accompany prawn crackers.
Thai staff at the restaurant, who are used to the smell of the sauce being prepared, were baffled initially by the commotion. Chalemchai Tangjariyapoon, the chef, said: “I was making a spicy dip with extra-hot chillies that are deliberately burnt. To us it smells like burnt chilli and it is slightly unusual. I can understand why people who weren’t Thai would not know what it was. But it doesn’t smell like chemicals. I’m a bit confused.”
Supranee Yodmuang, the waitress on duty, said: “The first we knew about it was at about 4.30 in the afternoon when the fire brigade came. They led us out to where the streets had been cordoned off and we waited there for about three hours.
“They said there was a chemical smell and I remember saying to someone that maybe the smell was the chillies, but then we said that that was not possible. When we came back at 7.30pm we saw the door had been smashed and there were fire brigade and police waiting outside. I was a bit scared but they were very nice about it and we showed them that the ventilation was working. Next time we might put some posters up to say we are cooking the dip. The restaurant has been here for 17 years and this has never happened before.”
Sue Wasboonma, the owner, said: “The smoke didn’t go up into the sky because of the rain and the heavy air. It’s the hottest thing we make. We are very proud of this dish. It is home-cooked and the customers love it.”
Daniel Spinath, the owner of Crepe Affaire, a neighbouring restaurant, said: “It was a very sharp and hot smell. It got in the back of your throat. I have eaten at the Thai Cottage and the food is very good.”
The chef mixes the charred chillies with 4½ of garlic flakes, more than 2lb of dried shrimps, 6½lb of palm sugar, 2½lb of shrimp paste, more than 2lb of tamarind and 9 pints of vegetable oil. It is served cold.
Nam prik pao
4 tbsp oil; 3 tbsp chopped garlic; 3 tbsp chopped shallots; 3 tbsp chopped dried red chillies; 1 tbsp fermented shrimp paste; 1 tbsp fish sauce; 2 tsp palm sugar
Heat the oil, add the garlic and shallots and fry briefly. Remove from oil and set aside. Add chillies and fry until they start to change colour. Remove and set aside. In a pestle and mortar, pound the shrimp paste, add the chillies, garlic and shallots. Over a low heat return all the ingredients to the oil, and fold into a uniform paste. The resulting thick, slightly oily red/black sauce will keep almost indefinitely. If you wish you can add more fish sauce and/or sugar to get the flavour you want.
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Bless them at Thai Cottage, they are so bemused by all this! They are some of the loveliest people I have met in the 13 years i have worked in Soho - the waiting staff, chefs and proprietors are all my friends now... Last time I ate there I could hardly eat my dinner cause the woman who owns it was showing me her holiday photos from Chian Mai. If you live near and have never been there, do, it's very lovely food, fresh and reasonable prices for 'up west'. It's a no-frills place which adds to the legend it has become in Soho. Now they have to do a Levi Roots job and get a sauce out there on the shelves.
Skully, East London,
It's not 'super hot', it's a sweet sauce.. it's really lovely!
Adam Webb, MK, UK
To Mike Harding of London, Lucky the chef didnt have a back pack on!
Ben, London,
Oh my gosh!!!!!! I cant stop laughing at all. I remember this smell very clearly and know how strong! Make it more stonger smell by turning on a fan. whoaa!!!
It's the most rediculous news ever read.
KK, London, UK
British humor and roasted chili peper, miam miam! it is never too hot !
Minouche Vienne, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
One of the funniest news stories and finishings to an article I've read this year! Can all news stories be rounded off with a recipie please?
Michael, London, UK
Well I know where to go for authentic Thai now!
Sue, Islington, UK
Thoughtless knee-jerk overreaction is becomming all too common nowadays. Does anyone have any common sense left anymore, or has Al Qaeda successfully demolished that as well?
Scott, Durham, NC, USA
Many comments have been made by people who have, very obviously, never smelled burnt chllis; and who have no scientific knowledge. Scientifically, it WAS a chemical attack!
It is a funny situation one to be laughed at, not to be used as an excuse to berate the Brits.
Now, what would I prefer? The fire brigade to turn up for a pot of burning chillis or the fire brigade to not turn up, because they thought that it might be burning chillis. - No contest really.
Oh and yes, Americans are funny, I live with a rather beautiful one and I should know!
Marc, St. Barthelemy,
I have a bumper crop (3 plants) of Thai Dragon peppers in my garden this year, now I know what to do with them!
Roger Venable, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA
My Singaporean wife can turn our large kitchen into a zone of choking fumes just by frying garlic, chili, etc. to season oil in a kwali prior to frying noodles.
So I can entirely understand people not realising that the same on an industrial scale was a culinary process!
Stephen Phillips, London, UK,
Knee-jerk overreaction is becomming all too common nowadays. Does anyone have any common sense left anymore, or has Al Qaeda successfully demolished that as well?
Scott, Durham, NC, USA
Well, me and my partner for 2, are glad this happened! We have been to Viet Nam and Cambodia. The food was absolutely heaven;y! But the ingredients were identifyable and if you didn't like something, you could remove it before the overpowering flavour of tomato ( green -Yuk!), cucumber ( Ok dill pickled or cooked but raw - yuk!) and chilie ( Oh, Death! Especially if even what the Brits call "mild"!) bled in.
See, St Jamie is right, except nobody listened to his message and all jumped on the bandwagon! Mothers of teenagers are angry their kids are not eating "hel - fy" but they have only themselves to blame and should have known better!
Saint Jamie was saying you have to start them off young. If they're used to a variety of food then, new flavours won't be so hard to teach. Don't season the food, let the eater do it. Unfortunately, as I'm not fond of cooking, we still tend to go for ready meals. They are too spicy! We have thrown out a lot of them in the past couple of months!
Carlyle and Len Braden, Croydon, England
The firebrigade should be commended for using their power of deduction. Perhaps they made the link between mustard gas and the smell from chilli sauce!
Wing, Poole, UK
thanks for recipe anyway, bangkok smells that way always!
celeste, Paris, France
Um, sorry, Jennifer. We've still got you Brits beat in that area.
Teri, San Fancisco, CA, US
And here I thought that spicy Asian food had become common in Airstrip One. Oh well.
Thanks for including the recipe!
Eris Caffee, Houston, Texas, USA
How absurd!LOL! anyone w/a nose, especially those in the restaurant industry & especially those who have eaten the hot sauce before should've had some kind of idea it was PEPPERS!HELLO! who's paying for the door now?? and they thought Americans are funny!
tk, dallas, TX / USA
I think the chef was very lucky not to have been shot...
Mike Harding, London, UK
What a bunch of idiots! I have not read anything so ridiculous since, well, yesterday. Britain truly has become a den of the ignorant, paranoid and the supertitious once more. Al Qaeda must be laughing their beards off!
Jennifer Hynes, Plymouth, England
How amusing, no wonder English cooking is so bland, a simple dip is confused for a chemical attack!
Farrukh, Woking, UK