Recently I was invited to a Diwali party by an Indian friend. I am very much a white American, and I don’t eat a ton of Indian food because frankly I don’t like the taste. I was warned profusely that one of the dishes was super spicy, but I like spice so I gave it a go. I was worried it was going to be crazy hot… It literally had some jalapeno in it. It was not spicy at all. They were all looking at me like they couldn’t believe I was eating it because it was so spicy, and some said they couldn’t even eat it. I eat a ton of spicy Mexican food, and frankly this dish didn’t hold a candle to the salsa roja at my local taqueria, so I’m not sure I buy this scale based on my extremely limited experience.
As a millenial brown dude I can definitely see this happening. Basically all the feedback I got growing up was that white (and some Asian) people cannot handle the spice in our food which is why it was often made fun of (along with Mexican food). A lot has changed since then but there is an innate reflex to tell white and some East Asian friends and colleagues to be careful with it and it’s hard to break. No one wants to see another person get ill from their food simply because their digestive tract is not accustomed to it.
It’s very similar to the reflex that makes me stop my toddler from eating anything with spice but then she actually likes it and I’m like oh yeah, that tracks, you’re a mini version of me 😆.
I will say that palates universally have broadened in the past few decades. When I was growing up it wasn’t uncommon to see people (even grown adults) physically recoil, make faces or pinch their noses in the presence of Indian food and a lot of folks have really stepped up their game since then.
Indian spicy is itself a spectrum. People from South India laugh at what north Indians usually call spicy. I can only barely handle south indian spicy food but I can usually handle spicy anything else.
I visited Hyderabad recently and didn’t struggle with any dish that was made for me. I told them to make it spicy as well, and I asked my friends to verify that it actually was spicy.
I think most Americans are just cry babies. Now, the food poisoning did fuck me up, real bad. That was a very quick ‘no I think I go home now’.
Recently I was invited to a Diwali party by an Indian friend. I am very much a white American, and I don’t eat a ton of Indian food because frankly I don’t like the taste. I was warned profusely that one of the dishes was super spicy, but I like spice so I gave it a go. I was worried it was going to be crazy hot… It literally had some jalapeno in it. It was not spicy at all. They were all looking at me like they couldn’t believe I was eating it because it was so spicy, and some said they couldn’t even eat it. I eat a ton of spicy Mexican food, and frankly this dish didn’t hold a candle to the salsa roja at my local taqueria, so I’m not sure I buy this scale based on my extremely limited experience.
As a millenial brown dude I can definitely see this happening. Basically all the feedback I got growing up was that white (and some Asian) people cannot handle the spice in our food which is why it was often made fun of (along with Mexican food). A lot has changed since then but there is an innate reflex to tell white and some East Asian friends and colleagues to be careful with it and it’s hard to break. No one wants to see another person get ill from their food simply because their digestive tract is not accustomed to it.
It’s very similar to the reflex that makes me stop my toddler from eating anything with spice but then she actually likes it and I’m like oh yeah, that tracks, you’re a mini version of me 😆.
I will say that palates universally have broadened in the past few decades. When I was growing up it wasn’t uncommon to see people (even grown adults) physically recoil, make faces or pinch their noses in the presence of Indian food and a lot of folks have really stepped up their game since then.
Indian spicy is itself a spectrum. People from South India laugh at what north Indians usually call spicy. I can only barely handle south indian spicy food but I can usually handle spicy anything else.
I visited Hyderabad recently and didn’t struggle with any dish that was made for me. I told them to make it spicy as well, and I asked my friends to verify that it actually was spicy.
I think most Americans are just cry babies. Now, the food poisoning did fuck me up, real bad. That was a very quick ‘no I think I go home now’.
I believe they are from the north, so that tracks.
The only time spicy food has really knocked my socks off is particularly spicy ramen.
Indian food gets a 7/10 on the scale, the few dozen times I’ve had as spicy as they’d give me.