Baby You can Light My Fire

--Or--
Is it Chili in here or is it just me?

Imagine that there’s an early hominid wandering through a forest.  It’s a nice day.  He’s been hunting, but hasn’t found anything for dinner just yet. He looks and sees a small plant with a number of dangling red fruit-y things.  They’re not as long as his finger, and the’re about that big around. He’s seen things like it before, but never this exact thing.  Other fruit-y things He’d eaten have tasted really good, kinda sweet, sometimes with a bit of tang.  So, he pulls a few off.  They feel lighter than most fruits, as if they were hollow.  Still, he lifts one up to his mouth and takes a bite.

Immediately his mouth floods with pain, as if it were on fire.  His eyes tear and his face feels flush and hot.  All he can think of is getting something to cool down the burning on his tongue.  He sees a stream nearby and rush to it, cupping the precious cool water in his hands.  Each drink cools the heat and calms the pain, but only for a moment, so he drinks more and more.

Finally, he stops, because it just isn’t helping.  But it’s not long before the pain begins to subside, and he shakes his head and walks away, a valuable lesson learned.

Today, of course, we know of the evolutionary value of a defense mechanism like this. If everyone that tries to eat you ends up screaming in pain, you don’t get eaten very often. Your species lives and reproduces.

But that only works if the predators are smart.  And, we’re dealing with humans, here, or the ancestors of them. Humans are not known for taking lessons well. See, because somewhere along the evolutionary line, one of our great-great-great-great-etc grandparents actually went BACK to that burning bush and ate those peppers A SECOND TIME.

Maybe he just gave them to a friend so he could laugh as the victim of his prank danced and guzzled like he had done the first time. But, no matter, at some point someone decided that this burning blaze on his tongue, this firey feeling was a good thing.

And that’s why, today, we have hot sauce.

The other day, I saw this video that explains why 1) peppers burn our mouths, and 2) why it feels so good afterward.  It’s a fascinating video and article, and in summary it says that the capsaicin molecules in the peppers (which actually cause the heat) react with the nerve receptors on our tongues and fool them into reacting as if they’d actually touched something physically scalding hot.  Our minds actually think that our tongue is scalding.

The reason water doesn’t help is that the capsaicin is an oil, so the water doesn’t wash it off.  It only temporarily tells the tongue nerve receptors that they’re cool.  Then, when the water’s gone and swallowed, the heat comes back because the capsaicin is still there.

That heat and pain also automatically trigger our body's responce, which is: pain relief!  Endorphins!  That's why after, you feel flush and excited.  In fact a few pain creams and ointments utilize capsaicin to trigger the body's natural pain relievers, topically.

It’s interesting to note that, according to the article, the menthol in mint and mint candies work the opposite way, fooling your tongue into thinking it’s touching something cool.

Wow.  Knowledge is cool.

...Or is it hot?


Mark has discovered a love of Dutch Oven Cooking. Mark also has other sites and blogs, including MarkHansenMusic.com and his MoBoy blog.

Food and Politics Part IV: Local Food

So, I read over here: http://edible-wasatch.ppwd.stackablehost.com/edible-utah-events/eatlocalweek that this week is "Eat Local" week. It's a week of events, mostly in the Salt Lake City Metro area, designed to raise awareness of and to celebrate the "Local Food Movement". The idea is to try and eat foods that were produced within 250 miles of your home.

I'm not one to jump in on food movements. I'll occasionally make a meal that's vegetarian, and I like to shop at farmer's markets and I've even been in a food co-op from time to time. I'm fascinated by deconstruction, and even molecular gastronomy. I love to explore the world's food.

But even with all that. I'm not really committed to any one of them. Except cooking them outdoors, or in Dutch ovens. I pretty much stick with that. It's kinda my schtick.

The local food movement is something, however, that I've always liked. As I said, I love shopping at farmer's markets, and I like getting things from the roadside stands that are all over Utah in the later summer and early fall. I think it's great to buy from smaller local farms. Here are some thoughts.

1 - When you shop for local food, you never really know what you'll get, and shopping is a bit of an adventure. Sometimes, I'll go there without an idea of what I want to cook. Then, I get my ideas from what I see. I think that's a lot of fun. Sometimes, what you get is more flavorful and colorful than the supermarket competition. Other times, it's on par. It's that variability that ads flair, I think.

2 - I was in a larger supermarket, a Smith's, the other day, and saw that they were putting up displays that celebrate local food. In the produce section, for example, next to some of the veggies, were pictures of the farmers that had produced what was in the bin. So, sometimes you can get local with the convenience of the supermarket.

3 - I remember one time last summer, I stopped off at a street corner produce stand, and in talking with them, found out that the corn they were selling had been trucked in from California the night before. Local food? Not so much...

Overall, I think it's a great idea. In the past, I've tried to shop local food whenever it was easy and convenient. I think that, in the future, I'll make a broader effort to include local foods in my ingredients and mention that whenever I can in the blog. You know, food trends come and go, but I think this is one worth building on.