I’ll begin this week’s column with a rash generalization: The hotter the climate, the spicier the food. This most likely is not 100 percent accurate, but I feel for the most part it’s true. Think about it for a minute, or even look at a map if you have one handy. The closer to the equator a country is, the hotter its climate and its cuisine. I’ll take this one step further to say that the hotter the climate, the more heavily the cuisine relies on spices in general.

This may seem obvious on one level but not so much on another. What’s obvious, I think, is that it reflects what grows in different climates. Cayenne peppers, for example, grow readily in south Louisiana but not northeastern Canada. Traditional northern cuisines often rely on the heavy use of cream and butter—stuff to really fill you up for a frigid winter’s day. Cuisines of the Deep South, on the other hand, often flavor their food with chilies. I use this example in particular because some believe that Louisiana gumbo is the outcome of an evolutionary metamorphose of chowder (or chaudrée in its original tongue), which was adapted when the Acadians (later to be known as Cajuns) migrated south and adapted the recipe with local ingredients. So this is a perfect example of a similar recipe in a different climate: cold climate, not spicy; hot climate, spicy. Chowder and gumbo are first cousins.

Besides the fact that chilies proliferate in steamy climates, there’s another reason for spicy food in hot weather. Capsaicin is the odorless and flavorless compound in chilies that gives them their fiery kick, but it also makes you sweat, and while this may not be the most attractive thing to do, sweating (or more precisely, the sweat that evaporates) is our body’s natural air conditioning. Sweating cools us off. I realize that I could have chosen the nicer word, perspire, for a food column, but I’m sorry, when you eat hot food in hot weather you don’t perspire, you sweat. It’s interesting how it happens: The chilies sort of fake out the brain. Apparently capsaicin stimulates the tongue and mouth, making the brain think that your body temperature has risen, and as a result the brain turns on your body’s air conditioner.

Another theory about chilies and spices in general is that they were also used as food preservatives. A perfect example of this is chili con carne, which translates literally as “chilies with meat” (second cousin to chowder, once removed). Some say that chili began as not just a recipe but as a way of preserving the meat in the recipe, or at least extending its usability in the hot Texas sun. And early recipes were just what the name suggests: chucks of meat simmered in liquid with salt and chilies. The high ratio of chilies and salt may have preserved meat to a certain extent, and what began as a necessity soon became a staple. I personally have a difficult time believing that spices alone preserve meat; a large ratio of salt maybe, but not chilies. What chilies may do is camouflage the taste of slightly tainted meat; keep in mind we’re talking about pre-refrigeration days.

On a more healthy and contemporary note, there’s somewhat new research that proves spicy foods do far more good than make us sweat. I recently read an article that says spicy foods, or more specifically the capsaicin in them, can raise your metabolism and curb appetite. I’ve come across other sites that claim capsaicin is heart healthy, anti-carcinogenic, anti-inflammatory, and even a natural pain reliever—which seems like an oxymoron to me, given the pain it can inflict when you eat it. I have no idea whether these claims are true or not, but two things are for sure: Spicy food tastes great, and it sure makes you sweat.