20090927 new post also below
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If you read the post from Sept 3 then it might make sense – symptom: incredible systemic joint pain. On the 5th the pain was constant and had increased from the day before. It didn’t prevent me from doing anything it was simply present. So, a little break from the peppers is in order. This is a drastic change in routine considering I often use Tobasco sauce in addition to any fresh peppers for the difference in taste (along with the signature zest). Since the compounds and concentrations vary from plant to plant there is no single source but my bet is too many habaneros. My jalapenos are very hot this year, too. Maybe a little cross-pollination.
The bottom line – nightshade plants contain poison and peppers are nightshades.
A nice three day harvest-red bell, gypsy(mild 12o'clock), red and green jalapenos, red serranos, orange hot banana. All tasty and given away during my purge.
I do not buy into the nightshade “allergy” line of thinking. Given individual humans have different levels (thresholds) of sensitivity to all kinds of things I found and noticed the direct relationship between joint discomfort and eating peppers when I was 17. 32 years ago. It had been a while since feeling as uncomfortable as I did 4th-6th but I like the burning sensation like a junkie. I’m reminded this is poison. More is not better so the presence of a pepper patch outside my kitchen door is now an opportunity for self-control and meditation. Ha! Pay attention to what you are eating and pay attention to how you feel.
The purge began yesterday – no tomatoes, no peppers in any foods for at least 1 week (easy as I prepare 96% of my meals and use basic ingredients).
Speaking of food addictions I am greatful there are no peppers in chocolate.
Mars out.
It is the 15th and as I write this I’m cooking a tomato bisque with one red jalapeno and one small serrano pepper. So, I’m sliding back into the nightshades. No joint soreness or pain for the last three days and I’ve been doing a lot of physical work so I feel fine and am back into a more tempered pepper menu. The temptation is to use the food from my garden and I just can’t eat it all so I’m concentrating on taste.
If you you have a pepper story let me know – I’m interested. Use the comments below.
Thanks,
Mars.
20090921
Okie dokie – Do you see what I’m dealing with? The temptation, the compulsive need for instant gratification, the opportunity right outside my door. Look below. Top left going clockwise: Hot banana peppers as red as you will NEVER see in a grocery store, tasty with a nice zing; serranos as red as any door in China Town, zap!; a green bell monster, when you slice into this the juice sprays out of the little cells and has the distinct “bell pepper” taste you can only find fresh picked – you can eat this like it is, almost a touch of sweet and aromatic, crunchy and as firm as a fresh picked ripe apple; three red jalapenos – they are HOT not because they have turned red the green ones are just as hot – same burn, it is the taste. A sweetness is there under the fire. I’m going to stop before I start making goofy taste characterizations like the Wine Spectator reviewers. Then there are three so-called Gypsies. They are waxy and tasteless running from white to yellow for weeks. Then they turn orange. Then they darken to a nice lipstick red. When left alone long enough they taste like a sweet red bell pepper. It takes a while, though. My favorites are the habaneros. Partly due to the odd appearance of the bush – it looks like a bizarre holiday decoration of orange candy blobs on a green tree. The burn is like nothing else.
The tomato has the distinction of being the first fruit from one bush which dropped every flower all summer until about three weeks ago.
picked September 21
Tonight I took one habanero, one half yellow onion, 3 T. salt and the juice of half a lime. I minced the habanero and onion mixed with salt and lime juice and glazed 4 chicken breasts on the grill. I chopped and portioned the chicken for 4 meals (typically – 3rd world style with tortillas, beans and rice or on a spinach salad).
grilled chicken breast with lime, salt, onion, habanero
Oh yeah, no joint pain.
One suggestion for pepper lovers who fear the burn carefully remove all seeds AND ESPECIALLY the connective tissue between the seed and the inside wall of the pepper. This is the primary location of the chemical which gives peppers the fire.
Mars out.
20090926
Every couple of days I make a pot of beans. I use the beans in a tortilla, on the side or in a bowl with rice (basmati, short grain brown or jasmine, batch prepared every 2-3 days) and some chopped green onions and a pinch of cheese. I’m testing a theory which is this: cooked peppers have less of an effect than fresh peppers (as in a pico de gallo or salsa). This morning I prepared the beans in a style I choose to call “One Pepper Beans” (one specimen of each variety in my garden). This is very subjective but I am familiar with how I feel on average and how I feel when I have eaten too many peppers.
Here we go!
I write this after eating One Pepper Beans at lunch and dinner. Just a zing – nothing by comparison with the same pepper, onion, tomato, garlic in a pico de gallo (there would also be lime juice).
Food for thought.
Mars out.
20090927
More sadness. Peppers and Nightshade poison…
I blogged recently about nightshade poisons and my attraction to pepper tastes and burns. Over the past 48 hours I conducted a subjective experiment to see if my sensitivity to the nightshade poisons was greater, the same or less than it would be if the peppers were cooked or raw.
The conclusion was reached at about 3:00 pm today when my elbows then hands and knees began the joint pain after eating a large quantity of the One Pepper Beans over basmati rice with a dollop of Philly cream cheese at about Noon.
All of this is subjective – the pain is not a pain in the compound-greenstick-fracture sense, it is not even a pin prick. It is similar to Tennis Elbow. It is an awareness of a change of physicality (if that can be a word applied to pain). Like the way you become aware of the swelling in a sprained joint. The sensation of the swelling is not the pain of the sprain. It is still uncomfortable and since it is systemic it is not a pain like Tennis Elbow where it is in one location. Imagine it in every joint, including fingers.
Another analogy would be drinking alcohol. I know I feel the threshold has been crossed after the third Ketel One martini. Two tumblers, each with one ice cube, sipped slowly is nice and the third makes me feel intoxicated and uncomfortable. The analogy is made more perfect by the simple fact ingesting peppers is eating a poison and drinking alcohol is drinking a poison. A person does not have an “allergy” to alcohol in any clinical sense (though many claim it). A person is not “allergic” to peppers or tomatoes. Your body reacts to the poison a certain way at a certain level. Joint pain is typical with nightshades.
If I do not eat nightshades I will not have this joint pain.
There it is.
Mars out.
