How to Eat Spicy Food

By Perry Mack

If you’re heading to the southwest US or Mexico this winter, no doubt you’re going to run into some spicy food. – or it’s going to run into you.

Spicy food tastes hot because chili peppers contain an ingredient called capaisin which binds to a class of vallinoid receptors that exist inside our mouth. These receptors weren’t designed to detect chili peppers; they were designed to detect heat. Since capaisin lights up these receptors, your brain thinks hot and pretty soon you’re waving your hands in front of face, turning red and desperately reaching for a glass of ice water.  Just so you’re aware, Wasabi (the Japanese equivalent of horseradish) doesn’t contain capaisin, so you’ll need a different answer when, like a dragon, you’re nasal passages are smoking and on fire at Benihana’s.

Typically ice water doesn’t work so well because you’re trying to cool the receptors but they’re not really hot. Capaisin is oiled based so the water doesn’t dilute it. What you need to do is dilute the capaisin. Here are the top three solutions, get them ready before you start on that spicy cuisine. 1) Sugar - have a little honey on hand or add some sugar to the salsa if it’s too spicy or have a cool sweet non-carbonated drink like lemonade within reach. 2) Try some ‘cool condiments’ like sour cream or ranch dressing - milk products seem to help – so a cool glass of milk works too.  3) Eat some bread or rice with your spice, it will soak it up the capaisin and reduce the amount of receptors screaming hot, hot, hot!