GeoffM

Or lack thereof. Okay so I was expecting Indian curries to be mild, so last week in Vegas in an "English" pub I had to try the vindaloo - which indeed barely tickled the sweat glands on my head.

Move on to Mexican food. Loads of it around here, so it's probably quite authentic. Therefore I can't really complain if it's not really spicy like in the UK (where it has presumably been modified to suit the local taste and to drive the expectation of the UK punter). That said... I've not had anything Mexican that's been in the slightest way hot! Thankfully they don't insist on drenching everything in tomato-based salsa like they do the UK - I can't stand tomato. I do love all the choices of burritos, tacos, etc. Rare to find fajitas though. Even bowls of chili are pretty mild.

Cajun food, well I've always loved that, from three previous trips to New Orleans. The UK equivalent is laughable. Only slightly spicy here.

How about KFC spicy wings - same the world over, right? Nope!

Maybe my taste buds were zapped by the x-ray machines at the airport. Anybody else notice things don't seem to be so spicy?

Mummy in the foothills

I haven't found decent curry here either, even in an Indian restaurant, I tried a Thai curry a while back, very odd.
Real Mexican food isn't really hot spicy, just tasty.
I had a nice pasta meal the other night, made by my son and his GF it had Chorizo in and that was nicely spicy.
Cajun food never appealed to me. I have tried some very hot chili's usually homemade with family recipes around here. Oh and homemade Mexican salsa can be really hot.

AdobePinon

Thai may be your best bet for spicy. But they often refuse to serve it that way even if you ask. Indian is almost never spicy here. Fortunately, New Mexican food can be extremely spicy.

Bob

Pretty much spicy not meaning hot here.

Though have had a few rather hot curries here, there's quite a decent little Indian population around and it's great.

There's also a massive Brazilian population and the food is pretty decent, quite spicy, but not really all that hot like Indian food, but the meats are fab.

If you want hot, Cajun is probably the way to go, gumbo shrimp and the like, yum.

GeoffM

I forgot I did have a Thai curry in a Thai restaurant. I couldn't finish it, it was so hot.

No Brazilians around here that I know of, though I've been to one down in LA.

New Mexico, here I come! I remember having breakfast in San Antonio, TX that was pretty sweaty for a breakfast.

markwm

You can always dump hot sauce over it: that's what I do when I need a chili-hit. There's a chili store near to us which stacks the product by strength on the scoville scale: http://scovilleheatscale.com/.

There are some that are at the highest level and would peel paint from 30 feet. It's in the Farmer's Market (3rd and Fairfax) next time you're in LA.

Philk

I wasn't expecting too much from Michigan and I've only been here a few weeks but already found some good stuff

A local Chinese does a 'Mexican Fried Rice' that was really hot and spicy - and their 'hot' dishes are on a par wtih curries from England

Local Italian supermarket does a chicken sausage with mango and jalapeno ( yeh, not very Italian ! ) that blew my mouth off

Several local bars do spicy chicken sandwiches that get my forehead sweating

so no complaints from me - and if I did have any I've found a local Indian store that has every spice you could want to make your own

sir_eccles

Lots of places will have a spicyness scale. So if you call up for take out you can tell them "pad thai and make it 3".

Or just go out and buy a bottle of sriracha.

kimilseung

Have you tried a Korean restaurant?

They often cater to Korean customers and give them what they have back home, which can be pretty spicy. It is my favourite cuisine.

GeoffM

Kind of cheating though! Hard to explain but I like things that are naturally spicy, not spicy just because somebody's dumped chili sauce over it. Like Thai green/red curry, the chili peppers are an integral part of the dish. Or seasoning that has hot ingredients.

I need to go there, I keep hearing good things about it. At the San Bernadino county fair recently I bought a jar of "widow maker" chili sauce that doesn't have tomato in it. They were a local producer and this was about 2/3 of the way from mild to hot on their scale. A teaspoon sample of that on its own was enough to kick the sweat glands in to life. But it's a last resort - cheating!

There are a couple here though I've never visited. It's not quite the same as having a nice curry delivered to your door with decent naans!

I'll give that a try.

Yeah. On our honeymoon we were in Hong Kong for a few days and next to the hotel was a Korean BBQ restaurant. So good we ate there two days in a row! Apart from one or two side dishes, I don't remember it being spicy though. So we went to one here recently and it was much the same - nicely marinated meat, nice side dishes, but not really spicy except for one or two of the side dishes (Kimchee?).

kimilseung

The Bulgogi and Kalbi dishes (what is sometimes called Korean barbecue) are not what you want.

You want the soups and stews. (guk, tang or jigae/chigae)

Gochujang is the sauce, the more of this in your dish the hotter it will be.

Kimchee Chigae or Sun DuBu are good bets, or even BiBimBap as you mix all the ingredients together yourself, that can include extra gochujang.

and use the old ethnic restaurant selection method, if your party is the only group not matching the ethnicity of the restaurant, then it will probably be a good choice.

This is of no use to Californians, but for Washingtonians, this place is great:
Hosoonyi Restaurant, 23830 Hwy 99 Ste 114, Edmonds, WA

denzil75

We lived in NM for a short time and I have to admit we had some of the best food I had ever tasted whilst there. Funnily enough we went to a restaurant in Santa Fe where the salsa was amazing, it was too hot for me and I do like spicy. The husband wolfed it down!

markwm

Let me know if you do come down: I live 5 minutes from there.

Sally Redux

The Thai curries can be good. However once we asked for hot as it had previously been rather mild and the waitress started sniggering and brought us 2 curries which were stupidly over-spiced. We were trying to eat them looking cool as another family we know then came into the restaurant and we didn't want to lose face.

Anian

I hate it when places add so much spice that you can't taste the food over the burning tongue sensation. Spice is supposed to add some flavour, not cover it up.