Jalapeno Hellfire

This is about machismo. Well, machisma. That, and chili.

I make meaty chili. You’d think I wouldn’t given the whole vegetarian thing, but I do. It has pork and beef and pasilla because I can never find fresh poblano, not even at Vallarta.

More relevantly, it has lots and lots of teenily, tinily minced jalapenos. I can’t call it a brunoise because my vision hasn’t deteriorated quite that much, but I aim for that classic 1/16” dice.

I don’t wear gloves.

That’s where the macha comes in. I’ve made this chili at least a dozen times, not once have I worn gloves and not once have I had a problem.

Until today, obviously. Otherwise you’d be reading about something entirely different.

Ow! Ow, ow! Jalapeno burns.

Yes, I know water doesn’t help. I remembered that mere minutes after I tried it and before I tried olive oil. Capsaicin is fat soluble, the oil should have worked. Obviously, it didn’t. See previous.

Next I did what any red-blooded American would do. I ran to the Internet.

Turns out this is a real thing. People do suffer from jalapeno burns. At least they claim to and if they’re going to lie, I’d like to think the public is smart enough not to lie about something that makes them look as stupid as I feel right now for having done this.

Testimonial cures include: bleach, milk, olive oil(!), sour cream, lime juice, lemon juice, rubbing alcohol, white vinegar, Vaseline and Advil. The last is taken internally.

So far I’ve tried lime juice, milk, rubbing alcohol and even bleach. I just rubbed some herbal Vaseline-equivalent salve on, enough to gunk up the keyboard.

Yeah, no.

Still ow.

That’s where the metaphor comes in. Sometimes when painful things happen, the only cure is time.

Gotcha. You've just been ambushed by a platitude. Auntie wins, but it's a Pyrrhic victory.

P.S. The superb chili recipe is Dan Chaon’s, from “Alone in the Kitchen with an Eggplant” edited by Jenni Ferrari-Adler. For further testimonial, ask Scott. He’s coming to dinner tonight. Given the vegetarian thing, I have no idea what it tastes like.