Plant: "I will let you feel pain". Humans: "Jokes on you, I'm into that shit"
this post was submitted on 21 Mar 2025
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It's funny if you think about it: Plant makes chemical (capsaicin) to help it thrive > humans love the painful spice, start growing and propagating peppers > Peppers spread grow like crazy. Evolution working exactly as it should
meanwhile chinese cooking: i'll have all 3 at once please
And it's so. Damn. Delicious.
Does anyone have an explanation for why they would evolve to prevent being eaten by mammals? I would think having mammals help spread their seeds would be beneficial?
Birds eat them without feeling the heat. And they can spread seeds more effectively as you can imagine.
Found the answer myself. Protects against fungal attacks. Also birds don't have the same receptors to capsaicin.
If not delicious then why delicious shaped?
I dunno, seems to have worked out for the chillis - there’s more of them now than ever before
That's because evolution is a results-driven process. All that matters is making viable offspring. Doesn't matter how it gets done.
Is it ironic that those two sauces aren't really that hot? 😂
Delicious, yes! But very low on the Scoville scale for hot sauce.
Sriracha is now completely random from bottle to bottle. It goes from Tabasco to Carolina Reaper with no visual indicator. Turns out fucking over your loyal farmers and having to constantly scrounge has negative consequences…
Is Tabasco delicious? I find the Sriracha from couple of years ago delicious (the current one is much worse), but Tabasco always tasted like a white vinegar mixed with capsaicin.
the only hot sauce i've yet to actually find appealing is sambal olek, somehow the heat in that just makes me salivate and kinda feels more like sourness, as opposed to everything else where it's just pain and like.. no real flavour? with sambal olek i can actually taste the flavour in it.
Yeah, Tabasco is the weakest link when it comes to hotsauce. Sriracha definitely is a step up, but even that has to move aside for the Buldak Sauce.
Buldak has become my go-to hotsauce. It's so damned good.
Valentina is my favorite. Both the black and yellow labels are good, but I like drenching shit with the yellow (milder one).
Valentina is really tasty. Cholula is also nice.
None are HOT, though. 😂
Tabasco sauce, and the peppers, are good for some foods, not so much for others. There is no ULTIMATE hot sauce, just what works.
Tobasco is great on pizza, but that's about all I use it for.
Tabasco is my breakfast hot sauce. Goes on omelettes, sausage, etc. More flavor than spice, really, just a little kick.
Yeah, Tabasco is overrated. Get Louisiana Hot Sauce instead. A little less heat, but tastes waaaay better.
Tabasco always tasted like a white vinegar mixed with capsaicin.
Exactly! Delicious.
It's sort of what happens though. A plant gets a defense mechanism, it becomes more abundant, something will target that abundant food source.
How fortunate then that the same species resistant to their defense actually goes on to cultivate it
Oh, we’re not resistant, we’re just crazy enough to like the pain. Birds are resistant and don’t feel it at all, they can eat chilis like fruits.
It's just relative. Most mammals don't pay rent, taxes, or have to deal with the TSA. Once you do those things, spicy plant chemicals become a frivolous game.
I eat peppers just to feel something
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Life wouldn't be the same without Tabasco. How could I ever eat my cotton candy or cereals without copious amounts of it?
I’m actually surprised that I’ve never found cotton candy coated with tajin, now that you mention it.
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Tobacco plants: produce nicotine, a toxic alkaloid
Humans: imma smoke that shiiiiit
Humans: I will now cultivate you, export you, protect you and make sure you're growing well so I can keep smoking you despite a 50% chance of dying from it.
Tobacco clearly has the last laugh in this story.
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