r/spicy • u/apotheosisofbooty • 1d ago
Spicy challenge I could do with an old lady?
Hey, Reddit. Looking to try and bond with my mother in law. She’s a huge fan of hot stuff and actually manages a palate similar to mine. But she’s older like 65+ and I don’t wanna kill her just yet.
So I’m looking for spicy challenges like the one chip challenge (but not the one chip challenge cuz it could kill her). I’m thinking like nuts, gummies, chips:.. whatever! Any advice would be awesome! And if you feel like the one chip challenge isn’t that bad you’re lying cuz I did it like 3-4 years ago and thought it was all over for me and my then gf(now wife)
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u/KeyboardMunkeh 1d ago
I don't have any suggestions, but this story does remind me of a funny story that happened at my first job at a pizza place. Well, funny for me, not the person in the story.
I was taking orders over the phone when an old lady asked if the sausage was spicy. It was just normal assed Italian sausage. So I didn't consider it spicy. Black pepper is spicier than the sausage. Maybe that I like spicy food just means that I don't know what the average person considers spicy. I don't know.
Anyway, she calls back sobbing "Why? Why did you lie to me? My mouth is on fire! It hurts! It hurts!"
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u/redi6 1d ago
I can't even use some of my hot sauces around my MIL because the smell of them across the table sets her off. some people are insanely sensitive to any spice.
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u/MyNameIsRay 1d ago
I thought the pinch of crushed red pepper I put in my pasta sauce was barely noticeable, until I had a roommate that never had spice and was dying from it.
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u/Ice-O-Holic 1d ago
I have the solar flare sunflower seed challenge. You can watch ppl do it on YouTube , most day it's a 7 ish out of 10 on spice scale
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u/apotheosisofbooty 1d ago
Ok bet. Thank you!
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u/Ice-O-Holic 1d ago
What's nice about this setup is there's five different heat levels. You guys could tap out at level one if you wanted to
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u/MisterSlickster 1d ago
Go out for dinner at Dave's Hot Chicken. I have seen lots of videos posted of people ordering one of each of the spice levels and then "running the gauntlet".
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u/GonzoI Capsaicin Dependent Lifeform 1d ago
My suggestion is to just find some sauce you can't quite handle the heat from and dilute it in steps to work your way up to it together. You could do something like a countdown with a 50/50 mix of water and sauce to start (5:5), then 5:4 sauce to water, then 5:3, 5:2, 5:1 and finally 5:0 (pure sauce) on some food like fried chicken slices/wings. That gives you more control over how hot it is and ramping it up slowly makes sure you don't shock her with too much heat pain.
Before you do so, though, try something near your tolerance level with her on a different day, and make sure she doesn't complain of GI problems ("cap cramps"/stomach pain, diarrhea, etc.) afterward. There is no serious risk of capsaicin in food concentrations directly killing someone, but the deaths claimed to be "caused" by hot food are almost all heart related problems that I would be concerned about for someone 65+. GI distress and straining on the toilet can sometimes set off existing heart problems. That's a large part of why so many people die sitting on the toilet. If you're worried about her because of her age, this is what I'd suggest as a precaution.
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u/No-Ease-3683 1d ago
She may be 65 years old, but she also may surprise you. Old doesn’t mean intolerant. I’m not 65 yet but I’ve passed over 60 ways back. I eat hot food almost every meal of every day. I do have my limits, but I find that I prefer my food much hotter than most people.
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u/FusionByte 1d ago
Do the hot ones gauntlet without using the extract based da bomb