Question 1

What makes chillies hot and how is the heat measured?

Accepted Answer

The heat comes from **capsaicin** and a handful of closely related compounds, collectively capsaicinoids. They are concentrated not in the seeds, as commonly believed, but in the pale **pith or placenta** — the membrane the seeds are attached to. Seeds taste hot only because they sit against it.

Capsaicin does not damage tissue. It binds to a receptor called **TRPV1**, which normally detects physical heat above about 43°C. The nervous system cannot distinguish that signal from actual burning, so the brain reports heat and pain when nothing hot is present. This is why chilli heat is described as a sensation rather than a taste — it is not detected by taste buds at all.

Heat is measured on the **Scoville scale**, originally by dilution: a chilli extract was diluted in sugar water until a panel of tasters could no longer detect heat, and the dilution factor became the rating. Bell peppers score 0, jalapeños roughly 2,500–8,000, habaneros 100,000–350,000, and the hottest cultivated varieties exceed 2 million. Modern measurement uses chromatography to quantify capsaicinoids directly, then converts to Scoville units for familiarity.

Because capsaicin is **fat-soluble and not water-soluble**, water spreads it around rather than removing it. Milk works because it contains fat and casein, which binds capsaicin. Yoghurt, ice cream and full-fat dairy all help; beer does not.

Tolerance is genuinely trainable. Repeated exposure desensitises TRPV1 receptors, which is why regular chilli eaters need more for the same effect.

Birds lack the receptor entirely, which is thought to be why chillies evolved the compound — mammals chew seeds, birds spread them.

Question 2

Why does food taste bland when you have a cold?

Accepted Answer

Because most of what you experience as flavour is actually smell, and a blocked nose removes it. The tongue does very little of the work. Taste receptors detect only five basic qualities: sweet,

Question 3

Why do recipes say to fry spices before adding liquid?

Accepted Answer

Because the compounds that carry most spice flavour are fat-soluble, and heating spices in fat extracts and disperses them in a way water cannot. The technique is called blooming, and it is the

Question 4

What does blanching actually do?

Accepted Answer

Briefly boiling food and then stopping the cooking immediately, usually in iced water. It serves several different purposes, and which one applies determines how long you do it for. Deactivating

Question 5

Why does a sharp knife matter?

Accepted Answer

Because a sharp knife is safer, faster and produces better food — and the safety point is the one that surprises people, since a blunt knife is the more dangerous tool. Why blunt is dangerous. A

Question 6

Why do green vegetables go dull when cooked?

Accepted Answer

Because heat and acid destroy chlorophyll, converting the vivid green pigment into a drab olive one — and the change is chemically specific and largely preventable. What happens. Chlorophyll contains

Question 7

Is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable?

Accepted Answer

Both, depending on whose definition you use — and the disagreement is not a trick question, it reflects two genuinely different classification systems. Botanically, a fruit is the mature ovary of a

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