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Hamish and Andy’s Perfect Holiday: Hamish had ‘saliva coming out of his eyeballs!’

Hamish Blake was lucky to survive a brutal challenge that Andy Lee gave him during the filming of their new TV show.

Hamish Blake's extreme eating challenges

Andy Lee still feels a little guilty about a brutal challenge he put Hamish Blake through for their new TV show.

In Hamish and Andy’s Perfect Holiday, which premieres on Channel 9 on November 17, the two comedians travelled to America and took it in turns plan activities for the other person.

“A lot of this show was going to lengths to try and hide the activity from the other person,” Andy told news.com.au. “Sometimes there was a lot of work put in behind the scenes as misdirection.

“I had something planned that I thought he’d be suspicious of if we went to South Carolina where it actually was, so instead we took him to Las Vegas and I pretended that he was in a boxing match.”

Hamish and Andy's Perfect Holiday starts on November 17 on Channel 9.
Hamish and Andy's Perfect Holiday starts on November 17 on Channel 9.

Hamish, convinced he was about to go a few rounds with a professional fighter, hired a trainer to teach him some moves. But on the day of the fight, the actual challenge was revealed and it was far worse than he ever imagined.

“He was all fired up for the boxing match and then he found out at the last minute that his opponent was actually the hottest chilli in the world,” Andy said.

Hamish had a “sportsmanlike” reaction when told of the challenge, Andy said, but he got more and more nervous as he was told about the chilli.

“It’s called Pepper X,” Andy told news.com.au about the chilli. “It’s from South Carolina. No one had ever eaten it raw, Hamish was the first person.”

This is Pepper X, the world's hottest chilli.
This is Pepper X, the world's hottest chilli.

To give you some context, a chilli’s “heat” is measured on the Scoville scale and a jalapeño registers between 3500 to 8000 SHU (Scoville heat units). Pepper X registers 3.18 million SHU.

“The lengths to get this chilli were extraordinary,” Andy told news.com.au.

“I asked Ed Currie, who bred Pepper X, if could get it to Vegas for us because that’s where I wanted to set up the ‘boxing match’ for Hamish. He said travelling with them was really difficult. Because of its power, it’s like travelling with a weapon.”

Currie worked with quarantine and customs officials to get the chilli from South Carolina to Las Vegas and had to put Pepper X in an ice box.

“Gloves had to be worn at all times when handling the chilli,” Andy told news.com.au. “If you get some on your skin, it basically burns and causes blisters. It can get really bad really quick.”

Which begs the question: how did Hamish go in the challenge which required him to eat Pepper X?

“During the ‘boxing match’ I said, ‘I think there’s saliva coming out of his eyeballs!’” laughed Andy. “And that was amongst panic and laughter. I was going, ‘Holy s**t!’”

Hamish looks like he struggled a bit.
Hamish looks like he struggled a bit.

Andy assured news.com.au that Hamish held no grudges after the insane challenge and said that his offsider “got his own back” with a challenge he arranged for Andy a few days later.

“I was asking the cameraman at the time, ‘Was this organised before the chilli challenge or after? Is this payback?’” Andy told news.com.au. “But apparently he had pre-planned it so it made me feel better about what I had done.”

Hamish and Andy’s Perfect Holiday will premiere on Sunday, November 17 at 7pm on Nine

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Original URL: https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/tv-shows/hamish-and-andys-perfect-holiday-hamish-had-saliva-coming-out-of-his-eyeballs/news-story/7eccf2c9322992fe1017b70e12361a0c