WASHINGTON -- Call it a way to assure salsa for future generations.

Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., was part of a congressional delegation that took a detour for a strange mission to an exotic land.

Durbin and the others on Sunday delivered an array of chili peppers to the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, designed as a fail-safe method to protect seeds for thousands of years.

In the so-called 'Doomsday' vault they deposited such fiendishly hot peppers as Wenk's Yellow Hots, Native American-grown tsile peppers and Pico de Gallo (Rooster's Beaks), a pepper so hot that cooks are advised to immediately wash their knife after cutting it.

Sen. Tom Udall, D-NM., one of the senators on the trip, said that the pepper seeds symbolized his state's "cultural heritage and the livelihoods of generations."

Durbin's office said that the stop at Svalbard was part of a trip to Norway and Estonia last week during the congressional recess.

Svalbard is situated on an island 600 miles north of the Norwegian mainland. The depository is a reinforced concrete vault carved into permafrost and rock. Seeds are kept in watertight foil packages that can preserve them indefinitely

The facility has drawn interest in the St. Louis area, a widely known center for seed and plant research.

In writing about the opening of Svalbard four years ago, the Post-Dispatch quoted Cary Fowler, one of the organizers of Svalbard as saying: "It's the farthest north in the world you can fly. It's a pretty exotic-looking place; no trees or shrubs. There are, in fact, polar bears and a sign that reads: Take Polar Bear Danger Seriously."

Fowler, executive director of the Global Crop Diversity Trust, accepted the hot pepper seeds along with genetic material from sorghum, melons, peanuts, beans, sesame, hibiscus, squash and gourd.

Others on the trip were Sen. Benjamin Cardin, D-Md., Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Ala. and Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Tex.