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Q: Hi Dave,
I have two questions.
1) I love fresh hot peppers (cayenne, Anaheim, jalapeños) and hot sauces too. I can handle a good bit of heat but not super heat. Just to give you a reference point, Tabasco’s Habanero Sauce is about my level of heat. When I’m eating peppers or hot sauce I get the hiccups quite often. Why? Is there any way to stop this from happening?
2) A coworker gave me a pepper, but she didn’t know what kind it is. It is long and large like an Anaheim (6 to 7"). The skin is red, shiny like a red bell pepper. The taste was sweet like a red bell pepper, but it had quite a bit of heat to it. It was hotter that a jalapeño or cayenne. One coworker compared the heat to a habanero, but I’ve never had the guts to eat a fresh habanero so I don’t know if that is an accurate comparison or not. Do you have any idea what it could have been?
–Peter
A: Hello Peter:
Answers:
1. Yes. Stop eating peppers or hot sauce. Seriously, no one knows why this happens or what to do about it. Generally speaking, if you hiccup, you are exceeding the heat level that you can tolerate, so try milder stuff.
2. That is an unusually high heat level for a pepper of that size. It could be a hot variety of New Mexican type, like ’Sandia’, or it could be a fat cayenne.
–Dave
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