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Comment by LukeShu | Hacker News Reader

You build up tolerance to hot stuff pretty quickly (and lose it pretty quickly). And most commonly-available salsas (even labeled "hot") top out at not-actually-very-hot. If your boss was only gradually adding more and more of the hot stuff, I absolutely believe that he could have just built up your tolerance such that you didn't notice; regardless of suggestion.

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> And most commonly-available salsas (even labeled "hot") tops out at not-actually-very-hot.

Yeah, that's what I always thought. Then I moved to New Mexico, and got my tongue, gums and throat handed to me on a plate.

Which brand? “Red or Green?” Even Sadie’s is quite a bit hotter than anything I generally find in California.

XX Hot (cultivar) are particularly good - clocking in at 60k Scoville units

Gordon Ramsay did some food shows in India. In one of them there is a hot pepper eating contest. He tests and bows out. A woman won by eating the most in a given time (maybe a minute), she beat the other contestants but not the record; so to up it, she rubbed the peppers into her eyes to win a bonus prize. WTF!! The audience seemed to “appreciate” it.

Apparently there is a gene for pain sensitivity, this Norwegian talk show[1] hosts [2] got their tested and their sidekick has a higher tolerance for pain. They tested this by putting their hands above some tea lights from 9:30 onwards.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQBs2xPDGKU (English subtitles available) [2] Incidentally they're the ones who made the hit "What Does the Fox Say?"

When I say "commonly-available", I mean "big national brands that you can find in a supermarket anywhere in the country". With less common/local brands, yeah, some are actually quite hot.

Please don't assume that other users here are all from US of A.

The same is true in Mexico

I despise the trend of having "hot" mean "mild", "very hot" mean "mildly hot", etc. Possibly the most ridiculous is Sabra hummus where the Supremely Spicy flavor is less spicy than the jalapeño flavor. Hats off to Cheetos for having possibly the most mainstream product of all but still managing to put actual heat in their "Exxxtra Flamin' Hot" version.

At least in NYC most immigrant establishments will serve you "white people hot" if you don't ask for "regular hot". Saying this as a white Polish, it took me a while after moving there to realize that I was being served a "white people hot" hot, and also that apparently Poles love their food way hotter than other (most?) European nations. That's even more interesting if you consider our otherwise fairly bland national cuisine. It's rather unusual for a Pole to avoid spicy food at all – if someone does, it is a notable exception.

Once I learned it, I would place my orders saying: "– Yes, hot please. Your hot, not mine."

As for spicy snacks, nothing can beat Takis Fuego! :)

But is there a biological mechanism for "building up a tolerance"? Seems possible that building up a tolerance is merely a mental exercise as well. Perhaps in the subconscious part of the brain at least.

Good question, one that I don't know the answer to. But I know an experiment that can help us find out! Spicy-hot is a complex phenomenon, but it is my understanding that a large part of it is that the capsaicinoids react with the heat receptors in your mouth to adjust their baseline temperature; making them react to normal temperatures inside your mouth as if they were physically burning hot. If tolerance is a purely mental exercise, then I would expect that I would not be able to accurately judge temperature of things in my mouth after consuming very spicy food; if I can accurately judge temperature then this would suggest that there is a biological mechanism at play.

I eat very spicy food and I've noticed for a while now I've lost the ability to detect when I'm being burned in my mouth (at all, it's actually a bit of an issue sometimes). The rest of my body is the same as it always was - save for my fingers, which I can use to flip things in hot oil (probably a result of exposure to hot oil). Perhaps you are on to something :)

Chef hands come from calluses and the nerves in your fingers dying a little, I think! It's pretty useful tbh

Yup! There’s a neurotransmitter for registering the compounds that trigger that hot sensation, and that neurotransmitter gets depleted over time, based on exposure. I don’t know the exact timeframes, but it’s on the order of days/weeks.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substance_P

Is it something similar for temperature? In my country some people go swimming all year around - even when the lake is covered in ice (they cut a hole). They say if you go everyday from summer to winter, you don't notice the temperature change and it's not such a big deal.

I’m not aware of anything like Substance P for temperature sensation. If I had to guess, it sounds more physiological— circulatory system adaption to handle colds exposures (e.g. blood vessel diameter). Maybe someone else here knows more and we can both learn!

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