Is It Spicy?

Contents:

  • What makes food spicy?
  • Get smart. Sign up for our email newsletter.
  • Some Like It Hot: 5 Reasons Spicy Food Is Insanely Good for You
  • Expertise. Insights. Illumination.
  • Top Posts & Pages

    • Capsaicin pronounced cap-say-a-sin , an organic compound produced by the seeds in plants of the genus Capsicum , is the active ingredient that gives spicy food its fiery heat. Not only is the human tongue the strongest muscle in the human body relative to its size, but it is also home to the millions of microscopic receptors that make our sense of taste possible. Capsaicin molecules in your food come in contact and bind to the pain receptors on your tongue.

    What ensues is a burning sensation, signaled by the brain, which is identical to what happens when you get your hand too close to a hot fire—it burns! The difference with the burn from capsaicin?

    No physical damage is actually done to the tongue. Kind of cool, right? While many of you can appreciate a substantial degree of heat from the plethora of chili concoctions out there, sometimes the burn can be too hot.

    What makes food spicy?

    What can you do if you overstep your threshold for pain? Menthol acts in much the same way as capsaicin, but in this case, it stimulates the fibers that register cold temperatures, not those that respond to warmth.

    Get smart. Sign up for our email newsletter.

    What can you do if you overstep your threshold for pain? Once diluted with other fats, the capsaicin molecules in your mouth are incapable of binding to the VR1 pain receptors on your tongue. A UCLA study found that capsaicin inhibited the growth of prostate cancer cells in mice while leaving healthy cells unharmed. Here are 10 of the world's healthiest herbs and spices, supported by science. She lives with her on-the-move family in Michigan for now. It had happened, I couldn't stop; my benign masochism had kicked in.

    This is why products containing menthol have names like 'Icy Hot'--menthol stimulates both the hot pain and cold receptors, sending the brain a really ambiguous signal. That difference explains why there is no confusing menthol and capsaicin: The chemicals fool pain receptors whose real purpose is to register critical events, like damage to the skin and the inflamation that often results.

    Some Like It Hot: 5 Reasons Spicy Food Is Insanely Good for You

    The tenderness around an injury is caused in part by the response of these same nerves to chemicals released in the skin. We humans are peculiar creatures--we've taken a nerve response that normally signals danger and turned it into something pleasurable. Sign up for our email newsletter.

    Readers of this thread might well find this thread from cooking. SE approaching the topic from the other angle to be of some interest: Is wasabi considered to be spicy or to be a spice? English really makes the life hard in this case.

    Expertise. Insights. Illumination.

    Use piquant [ pee -kuhnt, or pee- kahnt ] to describe something that is spicy hot. The Scoville scale measures the piquance of chili peppers according to the amount of capsaicin they contain. Use spicy to describe something having the quality, flavor, or fragrance of spice. Many curries are spicy without being piquant.

    1. Spicy food has longevity benefits

    Reserve hot to describe the temperature of something. Wikipedia - is there anything it doesn't know? Thanks for the awesome answer. I have a new fancy word to both expand my vocabulary and annoy the common person.

    • 2. Spicy food speeds up your metabolism.
    • The Infernova?
    • Is it Hot or is it Spicy? - Gapers Block Drive-Thru | Chicago Food.
    • Learn to Pray.

    Though OP might want to note that virtually no one other than perhaps a restaurant critic or cookbook author would describe a seriously spicy dish as piquant. My Pocket OED defines piquant as "agreeably pungent, stimulating". I doubt anyone would apply that to a Thai red curry or a phal.

    Top Posts & Pages

    I (and this Wikipedia article) recommend the use of the of the word piquance (or piquancy) to describe the condition of something being spicy. It was at a local bar that my friend remarked, through a face smeared with buffalo sauce, that the wings he was noshing on were particularly hot.

    Note also that Scoville gives Scoville Heat Units so that rather argues against the wikipedia article. Wudang - Speaking of which, I've heard serious spice-fanatics call a particularly hot dish "Scovillian". I'm not sure using piquant does eliminate the ambiguity, because in several definitions Scoville scale heat isn't a given.