Spicy or not la

I will very soon visit Thailand for the first time. It will a great trip for sure and I'm very eager to try the original local food! I'm just a little concerned about my resistance to the Thai chili... For a Westerner, I'm quite fond of spicy food (Korean, Chinese, Indonesian, Malaysian...), but I'm still cautious when I'm faced to a new category :-)

When you speak about the spiciness of different food styles with friends, it always sounds very subjective. Is there a scientific way to anticipate or assess the spiciness? YES!

Capsaicin 3D view

Do you know that capsaicin is the molecule responsible of the burning sensation when in contact with any tissue? And a very serious (or crazy) guy, the American pharmacist Wilbur Scoville, created the Scoville method to measure the piquance of a chili pepper in SHU (Scoville Heat Units). So, the time of debates is over, we can scientifically know which pepper is the spiciest! I let discover by yourself the details of the chili rankings, but here are some insights:

Our Thai friend

• 15,000,000 SHU: pure capsaicin, obviously at the top
• 5,000,000 SHU: law enforcement grade pepper spray
• 1,463,700 SHU: world record of artificial spiciest chili, grown by a crazy Aussie farmer
• 1,041,427 SHU: the Indian Bhut Jolokia is the natural hottest chili pepper!
• 50,000-100,000 SHU: the most common Asian chili, Bird's eye (พริกขี้หนู), with the cute scientific name of Capsicum frutescens, is only in the middle of the scale. In a way, I'm a bit disappointed, but it is still very hot :-) Interestingly, the varieties found in Southeast Asia today originated from South and Central America, and were first grown by Spanish and the Portuguese colonists and traders
• 2,500-8,000SHU : Tabasco sauce... suddenly tastes much less spicy, right?

So I feel now much more confident about my coming Thai food experiences!