Describing Heat, Spiciness, Pungency, Piquancy

[Peter the eater]

I like hot food, as in spicy hot food, but I find it difficult to verbalize the sensations that I enjoy. The Scoville scale is a useful way to describe the heat in peppers due to capsaicin levels, but what about all the other sources of spicy heat not from the Capsicum genus?

For example, how do you compare mustards? Some are so bland you could use them as contact lens solution without so much as a blink, whereas others reach inside your sinuses like acid steam before triggering a euphoric response.

Raw garlic, onions and ginger have heat. Cabbages can burn. Horseradish can overwhelm.

Is there some existing convention for quantifying these sensations? Something more scientific than "my scalp is tingling" or "that'll steam-clean yer donut"?

[Lisa Shock]

I like to mention whether the spiciness hits immediately, or if you get flavor first. I also prefer to describe where you feel it on the palate. For example, jalepenos get you right away and right up front on the tip of the tongue and keep burning. Whereas, cayenne sneaks up on you (allowing a taste of the food first)and warms the back of the throat.

[fooey]

This sounds like one of those "Eskimo have 30 words for snow" etymological problems.

I sometimes wonder, for example, if I'll ever understand balance in southeast Asian cuisine because I suspect they have 100 words to our 4 (hot, sour, salty, sweet).

I can visualize heat/pungency as a stick of dynamite: has either a short fuse (hits you immediately) or a long fuse (slowly builds) and either fizzles (gets only so hot, then fizzles out) or explodes (gets so damned hot that sensory system pegs**, doesn't report back after a certain threshold, somatic/psychosomatic feedback (numbness, ears ringing, "traveling ants on face" sensation, blurry vision).

Short fuse, fizzles = mustard, chopped garlic, shallots/onions, wasabi, horseradish

Long fuse, fizzles = serranos, chile arbol

Short fuse, explodes = jalapeños

Long fuse, explodes = habaneros, piquin

**I think our sensory systems shut down after exceeding certain maximum/minimum thresholds. Ask anyone who lives in a climate that gets extremely cold and they'll tell you that, much colder than -10 F (-23.3 C), you can't really tell how cold it is. It could be -40 F/C and it's just impossible to tell the difference between that and -10F/-23.3C. It's like our sensory systems are designed to operate between certain thresholds and, beyond those, feedback either stops or can't be discerned.

Edited September 18, 2009 by fooey (log)

[Tri2Cook]

**I think our sensory systems shut down after exceeding certain maximum/minimum thresholds. Ask anyone who lives in a climate that gets extremely cold and they'll tell you that, much colder than -10 F (-23.3 C), you can't really tell how cold it is. It could be -40 F/C and it's just impossible to tell the difference between that and -10F/-23.3C. It's like our sensory systems are designed to operate between certain thresholds and, beyond those, feedback either stops or can't be discerned.

With no intention of being argumentive, I have to reply to that one. As a person who lives somewhere where a large percentage of the long (5 months or more) winter is spent in the -30 C (-22 F) to -40 C/F or colder range, I assure you that, although you may not be able to name that temp, the body is very much aware of the difference between -10 and -40. I'm not doubting that what you say is true but I think you're going to have to dip down into a colder range before it kicks in.

[fooey]

...although you may not be able to name that temp, the body is very much aware of the difference between -10 and -40.

That's what I said. You can't name the temp.

re: heat/piquancy, I find you get to a certain point, and you can't tell (from the sensations in your mouth, palette, etc.) that the heat is getting hotter (like you can't tell the cold is getting colder); but, like you say with temperature, the body definitely knows. It's almost like the mouth says, "OK, brain, I've used all my magic tricks, your turn." Brain responds with somatic feedback like numbness, ear ringing, etc.

Edited September 18, 2009 by fooey (log)

[Tri2Cook]

Now I am being argumentive. What you said was "it's just impossible to tell the difference". You may not be able to say 'it was -10 and now it's -30' but you most definitely will say '#@%!... it sure has gotten colder'. You may not be able to make an absolute judgement but you can still make a relative one.

It works the same with the topic at hand. I've grown different varieties of habaneros and I can't tell you this type is 300,000 scovilles and that one is 400,000 but I can wipe away the snot and drool streaming down my face and tell you this one was hotter than that one.

[eatenmess]

i think the biggest thing here is the tradition of referring it to heat and heat being measurable. heat is measurable but not in this case. its the senses telling the brain it is on fire therefore its not actually on fire as such so no temp. in my mind there's only two ways of seeing chilli heat, pleasant and unpleasant. one person may find a certain dish too hot to even taste anything, the next person wouldnt flutter an eye lid at reducing it down and pouring it into their veins via a needle dipped in chilli juice.

chilli has to be a totally different phenomena to the other tastes(or sensations) simply because its not detected by the tongue but the brain. you also get different levels of sensation by the amount you cook it or how you cook it. therefore you couldnt put on a menu the strength of the dish being served because its perception through one persons life thus far. eg if you stew a chilli in a curry for a while u get a different sensation to the raw chilli you add on top.

i dont think there could possibly be a way to describe a chilli's sensation to be understood by all. it just doesnt work right now. there are many many many more people than tri2cook who can say the same story.

chilli continues to baffle me. may it never stop.

[Peter the eater]

Short fuse, fizzles = mustard, chopped garlic, shallots/onions, wasabi, horseradish

Long fuse, fizzles = serranos, chile arbol

Short fuse, explodes = jalapeños

Long fuse, explodes = habaneros, piquin

I like the weapons analogy, fits nicely into the batterie de cuisine concept.

I'm grateful that the human body has coping mechanisms for extreme stimuli, but what I wonder about is the non-chili forms of heat. Take wasabi -- the affordable green powder version, not the mysterious real stuff which I'm not sure exists anymore -- it's more like a pharmaceutical product than a spice. The sensations it can deliver are very different from habaneros or scotch bonnets, in my experience. Surely someone has written about these, maybe compared them, come up with a scale for isothiocyanate?

[Kent Wang]

Is all capsaicin heat the same? Fooey's description indicates otherwise. I believe habanero, jalapeno, serrano, etc. are all capsicums. Does the body just process different amounts of capsaicin differently?

Let's not forget about the Sichuan pepper (aka prickly ash) used widely in Sichuan cuisine (of course), that have a numbing effect.

[Peter the eater]

Is all capsaicin heat the same? Fooey's description indicates otherwise. I believe habanero, jalapeno, serrano, etc. are all capsicums. Does the body just process different amounts of capsaicin differently?

Let's not forget about the Sichuan pepper (aka prickly ash) used widely in Sichuan cuisine (of course), that have a numbing effect.

Here's what I think:

Capsaicin is the key player in making hot peppers taste hot, but there are other capsaicinoids at work. The effect in food can be measured using the Scoville scale.

Mustard, horseradish, cabbage, etc. don't contain capsaicin so I don't imagine the Scoville scale applies.

American Spice Trade Association (ASTA) has a chromatography test that gives ASTA pungency units -- these are related to the Scoville scale, but I'm unclear what compounds are being measured.

There must be some low-tech system out there for comparing mustards.

[judiu]

(much snippage)

There must be some low-tech system out there for comparing mustards.

Mmmm, hot dogs? (runs)

[paulraphael]

I'm interested in if there are different mechanisms by which we perceive piquancy. Supposedly capsaicin works by purely chemical means to create a pain reaction; we then interpret that as a component of flavor, even though it doesn't involve taste receptors in the conventional way. I wonder if other chemicals, like the ones in mustards or horseradish that clear the sinuses, work on us different ways.

Part of what makes this tricky is that our brains like to unify these disparate sensations into a unified one ... we take information from our aroma receptors, taste receptors, and other nerves in our mouths and noises, and integrate (or conflate) them into a flavor sensation.

As far as the debate over temperature, I suspect you're both right. There does seem to be a threshold below which it all just feels f'ing cold. But I think that threshold is colder than -10F.

[BadRabbit]

I like to mention whether the spiciness hits immediately, or if you get flavor first. I also prefer to describe where you feel it on the palate. For example, jalepenos get you right away and right up front on the tip of the tongue and keep burning. Whereas, cayenne sneaks up on you (allowing a taste of the food first)and warms the back of the throat.

I've always thought that the delay was because cayenne is much more likely to be in powdered form while jalapeno is more likely to be used fresh or pickled.

[Tom Gengo]

There must be some low-tech system out there for comparing mustards.

THere is actually a low tech pepper system, LOL. One "low tech" method is to eagerly anticipate "arrival" of the ice cream you ate the night before to quell the pain. Once heard a Catholic family member in the bathroom the day after Habanero caramel sauce praying for penance, lmao... but his a## was doing something other than laughing. Ever see someone perspire eating ice cream in January?

Another "low tech" that I have learned is to cut jalapeno peppers w/o gloves, drink a beer or 2 while doing said task and have an urgent need to relieve oneself. I, from a never to be forgotten experience, burned in a very sensitive area for more than a day. Instant OCD- compulsively wash my hands before using the bathroom w/ or sans pepper cutting.

Probably could use bodily function pathology: slight burn upon "removal" of the offending subject, med burn, heavy burn, multiple uses of the term HOLY SH##, diarhea, OMG- I just had diarhea w/o warning and am no where near a toilet, projectile diarhea and finally the deluded idea that someone is performing an exorcism on you and it has gone gravely awry.

[Tom Gengo]

One more "memory." In college we had a scavanger hunt pitting one half of our fraternity against the other 1/2. Some of the tasks over the years included walking a live lobster across Grand Central Station (attended Union College in Schenectady, NY), drink a beer in every bar in Faneuil Hall in Boston (over 20 bars), etc. One year some genius on the other team put in the challenge to "do a double shot of Tabasco." We needed to accomplish that task to win, so I agreed to do it... I threw back 4 ounces of Tabasco and all was fine... for about 4 seconds and my body went into rebellion w/ itself. All organs tried to send the toxin to another organ with the net result that the Tabasco went into my sinuses and out my nose... my "colleagues" thought I was having a stroke or had just welcomed a demon into my body b/c of the bodily gyrations, attempts at breathing water, and the deep guttural sounds which came from me and my body. It was an out of body experience that people talk about after dying and returning to life.

[Peter the eater]

True or false: a fresh hot pepper will get even hotter when frozen?

[MelissaH]

We refer to heat with terms like front-of-the-mouth vs. back-of-the-throat, and slow burn vs. quick.

MelissaH