Chilies: Pain and Pleasure
I can’t tell you how many times I have broken a sweat in a restaurant. I’m not talking about a girly glow. I’m talking about sweat pouring off of my face and dripping onto my plate. The kind of sweat that makes people stop and stare and wonder if perhaps I am some sort of drug addict.
Surely after so many embarrassing meals I would have learned not to order the spiciest thing on the menu by now, but there’s something about a chili pepper that I can’t resist.
That something, it turns out, is capsaicin, a chemical compound produced by chilies to ward off unwanted consumers. The higher the concentration of capsaicin in a chili, the hotter it is.

