My wife can swear that her mouth is on fire after eating certain foods, but when I try the same exact food I often barely detect the heat she’s talking about.
I wasn’t always like this, it was an acquired taste. Sweet chilli used to be hot to me, now I dabble with habanero, naga, etc so I know something has changed physiologically…what was it?
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So there are particular receptors that sense that hot food and give someone the sensation of heat. What happens is if you repeatedly eat hot food those receptors get down regulated. Basically there are fewer of them to sense chemical heat, and you feel less heat. If you keep eating increasingly hot spice foods this will continue to a point where something really “hot” to most people will be pretty tame to you. Your wife sounds like she is not eating these regularly which will mean this down regulation will not happen and will remain maximally sensitive to the heat. Anyway tolerance to spicy hot foods eaten regularly is caused by this process. If you wish to lose your tolerance to spicy hot foods, stop eating them for a bit, the receptors will be upregulated and you will become more sensitive to it again.
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