On Seaside Island, the village's annual Chili Dog Cook-Off is about to begin, and Team Sonic helps construct the stage, with Amy acting as supervisor. However, the guys and Sticks do a poor job, causing the stage to fall apart when Amy pulls out a load-bearing banana, prompting Amy to do the work herself. After Amy finishes, the gang gathers at Meh Burger to discuss what to for their participation in the competition (except Sonic who will be the judge). During this, Dave the Intern butts with a plate of his chili dogs to brag about his secret chili recipe for the cook-off. Sonic, however, is easy able to discern ingredients, annoying Dave. It turns out everybody wants to use a type of pepper that will help them win, and Knuckles reveals his secret weapon: a "one-of-a-kind" pepper with tiger stripes which he bought from Mrs. Vandersnout. As it turns out however, the others on Team Sonic had brought similar peppers from Mrs. Vandersnout, so the team confronts the elderly wolf to complain about their purchase.
Failing to deny her claims that her peppers were one of a kind, Mrs. Vandersnout tries to escape with her cart, only to crash immediately after. Still determined to win the cook-off with good-tasting pepper, Knuckles runs off into the woods and finds a red pepper. He tastes it, but it is too hot and he faints.
As the contest begins, Knuckles arrives with his new pepper, only to see that Dr. Eggman has entered the cook-off too using his Chili Maker 5000 and his Facepeeler Maximus, the latter which is so hot that it sets the bowl on fire. A defeated Knuckles then hears Mrs. Vandersnout calling him, and she scams him into buying a map that supposedly leads to a unique type of pepper known as the Lost Pepper of Claggerhorn. Setting off on his quest, Knuckles faces several hazards on his journey across the Lands of the Doomed, including climbing up the side of a steep canyon, walking up a staircase of terrifying slipperiness, and crossing a field of exploding ducks. Finally, he reaches the center of the Lands of the Doom, only to get caught in a trap and flung into a pit.
There, Knuckles finds himself tied down, and he hears the voice of who just happens to be Claggerhorn, a talking chili pepper and the captain of the Pepper People, a band of talking chili peppers with war paint and swords. Upon Knuckles' inquire, he tells him about how they lost Claggerhorn, their homeland, with all its relaxing hot springs, and that it was prophesied that a "big, dumb oaf" would one day come to lead them back home. Seeing Knuckles' dimwitted response to his story, he declares that their oaf had arrived, and Knuckles decides to help them reclaim Claggerhorn...which, really, turns out to be the village.
Back in the village, Knuckles and the Pepper People attack, knocking Tails down and making Eggman's chili maker malfunction. Sonic is able to dodge the Pepper People's attacks and tries to remind Knuckles that he is attacking his friends, but when Claggerhorn is about to attack Sonic, Knuckles finds himself unable to let Sonic come to harm, and knocks him into a chili pot. In the pot, Claggerhorn finds the sauce relaxing, like the hot springs of his homeland, so the Pepper People make a compromise with the villagers: they get to wallow in the chili pots and the contestants in the cook-off get to use their juices to flavor their chili sauces. Upon judging the chili sauces, Sonic immediately makes Knuckles the winner of the cook-off with his chili sauce made from Claggerhorn's juices.
Story over? Kind of. This is all revealed to be a dream that Knuckles had upon fainting as a result of eating the hot pepper in the forest earlier on. In the real world, Knuckles is awoken by his team, who had been looking for him since yesterday when he did not show up to the cook-off. Disorientated, he explains how a pepper knocked him out, prompting the gang to laugh at the absurdity of it, only for Knuckles to belch flames at them, leaving his friends severely burned; that doesn't really mean they don't laugh it off as the screen fades to black.
Tropes
- All Just a Dream: Knuckles' quest to find the Lost Pepper of Claggerhorn happens to be a dream he had from fainting after eating a hot pepper in the woods.
- Brave Scot: The Lost Pepper of Claggerhorn and his Pepper People (and later Knuckles). The funniest part is that Netflix prints of this episode even consider Claggerhorn to be a Scottish voice in the subtitles for the hard-of-hearing.
- Credit should go to his voice actor, Kirk Thornton, a non-Scot, for pulling off quite the accent here.
- Brick Joke: Cloud Cuckoolander Sticks pulls one off here:"Can [the stage] be used as a flotation device in the event of a water landing?" (Sonic, Tails and Knuckles give blank stares) "We'll see who's staring when that thing LANDS IN THE OCEAN!"
(later, as Knuckles sends the peppers to attack his friends, she knocks one of them toward Eggman's Chili-Maker 5000, causing it to land on the stage; the ensuing explosion sends it flying into a body of water, with the unfortunate badger still on it...)
"It can be used as a flotation device." - Foreshadowing: The increasingly absurd plot points hint that Knuckles is dreaming the second half of the episode.
- Hypocritical Humor: When Amy pulls a banana out of the foundation of the stage built for the cook-off, causing it to collapse:Amy: (lividly) Who builds...WITH A BANANA?!
(loud munching; camera cuts to Knuckles eating a plank of wood)
Knuckles: Only a total dum-dum! (munch) Bananas give splinters in my gums. - Leaning on the Fourth Wall: As the scene fades to the beautiful sights of Claggerhorn...Knuckles: What's happening?
Lost Pepper: It's just a dissolve, son. - Mythology Gag: Just take a wild guess at who the judge of the cook-off is.
- Shout-Out: The Lost Pepper of Claggerhorn and his Pepper People can't be anything more than a salute to a particular Mel Gibson film.
- Tradesnark™:Eggman: Witness now, if you dare, the Chili Maker 5000!
Cubot: Copyright Eggman Industries. Patent pending. All rights reserved. Some restrictions apply. - A Truce While We Gawk: When the Lost Pepper of Claggerhorn falls into one of the soup pots, he finds it very relaxing - so much so, in fact, he and the Pepper People make a truce with the villagers that they get to take a good hot soak, and in turn flavor the chili made by the villagers. When asked what the chili does, Sonic trips up by saying that he eats the Pepper People instead of the hot dogs it is put on, angering Claggerhorn, who very nearly calls off the truce until Sonic allows him a bite of a chili dog, which he considers to taste like "the world's finest haggis, but without the wretched taste of mixed lungs".
