Last night we tried using them in our cooking for the very first time.

I was making a sweet and sour sauce. Normally we add a little chilli-powder to make the sauce a bit hotter and spicier. Last night I replaced the chilli-powder with two chopped chilli-peppers.

I’ve read that chillies should be treated with caution because it can be very painful if any of their juice gets into your eyes. So – don’t laugh now – my wife fetched a pair of goggles I use when I’m doing DIY jobs. I wore the goggles while cutting the chilli peppers. When I’d finished with the chillies, I washed my hands thoroughly with soap and water – twice.

When we were eating – and the sauce was very tasty – my eye itched a little. I decided to rub it with, but – ever cautious – not with my finger.

I rubbed my eyelid using the shoulder of the T-shirt I was wearing. Instantly my eyelid began hurting with a strong burning sensation. A tiny amount of liquid from a chilli pepper must have sprayed onto the shoulder of my T-shirt while I was cutting them up.

I scrubbed my hands again with soap and water, then fetched a clean towel from the linen cupboard. This I made damp and cool with water from our fridge and held it on my eyelid. It soothed the pain very well. If I took the cool towel away from my eye for more than a moment, the burning pain returned strongly.

After about ten minutes, the burning pain had gone.

All I can say is I was very grateful the chilli liquid didn’t get into my eye and only got onto my eyelid.

So, even after all my precautions, I was still stung by the chilli peppers. Next time, we’ll return to tried and trusted chilli-powder instead.