Hello – thank you for stopping by my shiny new blog!
I’m Abby, a junior Biology major at Williams College, and this is my Winter Study independent project entitled “The Experience of Spice”. My project falls within the bio department, and I have a fabulous faculty sponsor, Professor Carter (hi Matt!). Over the next four weeks, this is going to be my home base for digesting (!) all that I’m learning about spice (specifically chili spice) and how that influences us as humans. I’m talking influence from a variety of levels – biologically (how do we sense what is spicy? What does this spice do to our bodies, and how?), culturally (why has spice been incorporated heavily into some cuisines?), psychologically (why do we eat something that causes us pain?), and personally, as I attempt to increase my tolerance for spicy foods over the next few weeks.
My project has a few components to it –
- I am attempting to train myself to eat spicy foods through a repeated exposure method. This is where the independent study all began – at this point, I have little to no tolerance for spicy foods. Eating spicy foods just does not sound like my idea of fun – why would I purposely set fire to my mouth if at all possible to avoid it? My aversion to spice has been totally limiting in my travels (yes, India was rough), my social life (no hot wing eating competitions for this girl), and general desire to eat interesting and delicious foods. So, that’s why I am adding a generous helping of various hot sauces to one meal a day throughout Winter Study. There is a slight method to this madness, however – every new week means a new hot sauce. The firey intensity of each sauce moves up as the month progresses, according to the Scoville Scale (SHU). I chose my sauces through a consultation with Tears of Joy Hot Sauces in Austin, TX – and at the time, I didn’t really understand what I was getting myself into. Checking the Scoville Units of my sauces, I am now realizing that January is going to be a really painful month. For perspective, a jalapeño pepper is regarded as 3,500-8,000 SHU, and my hottest is 350,000 SHU. Here goes nothing!
- I am going to be reading primary research to understand more of the neuroscience and physiology behind how we experience spicy foods. At the end of this month, I hope to have a good understanding of the “process” of spice within our bodies – from initial taste to the final sweat drop. What happens, why and how is it triggered? To do this, I’m going to be reading a lot of primary research focusing neuroscience and physiology. One of the main points of this blog is to be an exercise in “translation” – taking the interesting information I am learning in my research, and formatting it for a wide audience. I want to make this information easily accessible, because I think few things are cooler than learning about your own bodies. So here’s to hoping we can all get something out of this!
Along with these two primary objectives, I’m also hoping to do a bit of research into cultures with traditionally spicy diets (Mexico, Thailand, India) to learn more about the role chilis play in their lives. I’m going to do a bit of cooking as well, so stay tuned for some recipe appearances as the month goes along.
I’m hoping to post a few times a week on all things related to chili spice – from what I’m eating, what I’m learning, and how I’m feeling. Stay tuned!
Experiencing Spice 