Spicy food … most people either love it or hate it. Some people add Tabasco to everything and think nothing of ordering extra hot peppers with their burritos, while others shy away from any sort of heat or spice, even refusing to pepper their soup. I am someone whose taste for spiciness falls somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. I love food with a kick, but I don’t search it out the way some thrill seekers do. As much as I enjoy a good Pad Thai, I’m probably not ready to ask for the “extra-spicy” version.
Some people spend their entire lives eating spicy foods, and some are never exposed to the spicy side of life. Loving spicy foods isn’t an inborn personality trait; it comes through exposure and culture. What’s the main difference between a person who thrives on atomic hot wings and a person who eschews even mild sauce on their tacos? Lots and lots of practice.
Why We Get a Kick out of Chilies
Although spiciness can come from a variety of different sources, chili peppers are the most common cause of the heat found in Mexican, Chinese, Thai, and Indian foods. The active ingredient in chilies, called capsaicin, is responsible for the heat. Capsaicin causes irritation in the mouth; a burning, fiery sensation that the body perceives as pain. Capsaicin is the same compound that’s found in pepper spray. Different varieties of peppers contain different amounts of capsaicin, resulting in widely different levels of heat. The peppers contain capsaicin in order to defend themselves from hungry mammals, the only animals that can detect it. Most mammals avoid peppers and their attendant pain; humans are unique in that we like a little discomfort with our dinner.
In 1912, a pharmaceutical company employee named Wilbur Scoville devised a test for measuring the capsaicin levels of different varieties of peppers, and he came up with a rating system that placed them all on a hierarchy of heat. The scale is measured in units called Scovilles, with sweet peppers at the bottom of the scale with zero Scovilles, and pure undiluted capsaicin at the top with 16,000,000 Scovilles. Most common peppers fall somewhere between 500 and 50,000 Scovilles. Many people think that the habanero is the hottest pepper in the world, but in fact, the world’s hottest chili is the Naga-Bih Jolokia pepper, grown in India, which registers over a million Scovilles.
