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Ordering hot food at restaurants

Moshman

Moshman

Whenever I go to a restaurant and order a dish extra hot, it never is. The only way to get a dish served spicy enough is to make a specific point about it to the waiter then they stand there when it gets served waiting for me to keel over dead.
Does anyone else have this problem? I even ordered a bowl of chili on the side at indian the other night when eating with my wife and parents - they all wanted mild dishes, and they brought me a chilie paste that made ice cream taste spicy.
 
I think all chile-heads have this problem. The solution is to bring you own hot sauce/chile powders when you go out to eat :mouthonfire:
 
I don't know if anyone else has experienced this, but the one that cracks me up are these places that feel the need to warn you and double check that indeed you actually meant "extra hot" when you said it. Of course, once the meal arrives, it always fails to deliver.

The best one though was once when I was told to go to a particular Indian restaurant and ask them for "Indian hot". I ordered my meal, asked for "Indian hot", and the guy actually laughed at me then proceeded to warn me and asked three times if I was sure! After finally convincing him that "yes, I am sure that I want to make a fool myself :rolleyes:", I got my meal. When the guy came back with it, the idiot stood there smirking and watched me start eating! Well, the only fool that night was him - the look on his face was priceless when he realized I was eating the food without even breaking a sweat. Seriously, the only "heat" this meal delivered was a very slight tingle!

Needless to say, I never returned. Not because they couldn't deliver but purely due to their piss poor customer relations.

Another time I was at a Thai restaurant, ordered a green curry and asked for "extra hot", as to which the waiter took offense and told me that "The green curry is our hottest and does not need to be made any hotter!" and insinuated that I wouldn't even be able to handle that. OK, whatever, just give me the green curry. Of course, once the meal arrived, a very slight tingle at the most....
 
I usually have this problem. But on a rare occasion, I actually get surprised, and they usually get a huge tip. Otherwise, I'd just bring my own.
 
The only time I regretted asking for "the hottest you have" was at The Salty Dog in Norfolk, VA.

I will never forget those wings. :shocked:
 
If you look like a gringo, most waiters think you eat gringo food and think you don't really want picante stuff, even if you say so.

In general, gringo food is quite bland.

I got some picante phaal at a southern Indian restaurant.....didn't make a special request, it just came picante.
 
I like how you tell them you want it as hot as they can make it, and THEN some, they look at you blankly. Like "did he REALLY just ask that?" Its kinda funny....when I do that, and they ask "are you SURE?" M WIFE tells them, "you have NOOOOO idea." THAT usually gets them to understand. I have YET to go to a restaurant that has a dish TOO hot.
 
Count me in too - I have the same problem. I always ask to make my dish extra extra hot - as hot as they can make it. I usually get something that's almost as spicy as Heinz spicy ketchup. There were only 2 times where my food was the way I liked it. One of those times was a Pho restaurant in downtown Seattle, WA, where I kept adding hot chili sauce to my pho chicken soup until the broth was red. This was one of these rare time I could not finish my food because it was too hot. The second time was at a teriyaki restaurant in Duvall, WA, where I asked the usual "...make it as hot as you can..."' and got the usual blank stare - jaw dropped in shock response "are you sure?". They delivered big time on this - the heat was a totally awesome deep heat...it was excellent! I left the restaurant hallucinating with euphoric ecstasy! :hell:
 
I HAVE FRIEND WHO OWNS A FEW MEXICAN RESTAURANT NEARBY

HE KNOWS HOW I LIKE IT, I LIKE IT MEXICAN HOT AND BELIEVE ME IT IS HOT AND I LOVE IT!!

HE MAKES HIS OWN SAUCES THAT THE KITCHEN HELP EAT BECAUSE UNLIKE ME MOST CANT TAKE IT
I OFTEN GIVEN HIM MY PEPPERS AND HE MAKES SAUCE WITH THEM THAT IS WORTHY OF BEING ENJOY BY A CONSUMMATE CHILE-HEAD

IF ANYONE EVER GETS TO THE ALLENTOWN PA AREA GO TO

FIESTA OLE
1116 CHESTNUT ST
EMMAUS PA 18049
610-966-5522

YOU WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED

PS SORRY FOR SHOUTING

thanks your friend Joe
 
willard3 said:
If you look like a gringo, most waiters think you eat gringo food and think you don't really want picante stuff, even if you say so.

In general, gringo food is quite bland.
Click to expand...

I wouldnt say the white mans food is bland, overall it might be lacking spice (hottness) but NOT bland! no more than your mexican food being bland ;)
I can tell you I know some mexicans & let me tell you they're a bunch of wimps that cant even eat the level of heat I eat & some dont even eat chiles....I guess they only like to eat their bland mexican food :lol: :P
 
In Mexico, picante is not a machismo contest like it is in the US. Chiles come with food in Mexico because it's an integral part of the cuisine....most culinary chiles in Mexico are not very picante, ie, serrano, Xalapa, poblano, manzano, banana. Basic Mexican cuisine is not picante, they just always make it possible to add chile if you want it.

I've been in a lot of mercados and I've never seen a super-hot for sale. In the Yucatan you get some picante sauces made with chinenses, but this is the exception and not the rule.

Mexican mercado chiles:

593278-R1-01-23A.jpg
 
Hot food is a cultural thing. Israel for example is a mix of all kinds of cuisines, and it goes all the way from feeding raw African Birdseye paste to the kids and thinking that adding black pepper to the pot will make it hot... because of the demand you can find Serranos and such at almost every grocery store - supermarket, and at the local markets you might even find some hotter bird pepper types. with that said, I think it's just the amount of heat you're exposed to, as I for example am eating a much hotter food than most of the population around here.

PS
I love Mexican food! not cause of the heat, just cause it tastes so damn good!
 
I take it picante means hot and mercado means market?
We don't have a lot of mexican in aus, we have a lot of tex mex style food but that's about the extent of it.
Mostly in aus our restaurants that serve spicy food are thai, indian, chinese, japanese, vietnamese and other less common ones like spanish, korean, mexican etc.

I wouldn't put it down to being macho, it's really the fact that I look anglo so I don't get served hot food even if I ask for it. I can understand where they come from cause it would scare people away if the food was too hot but if you want it that way you should be able to get it. I don't grow chillies in the privacy of my own backyard to be tough, I just enjoy a bit of heat with my food. millions of people understand this, otherwise spicy food wouldn't be the cultural dishes of many nations.

Oh yeah, as I just got home from the pub, let's not forget that great turkish fare, the kebab with hommus, bbq sauce and extra chiilie. Now there's a eatery that's not scared to dish out the heat.
 
Willard, you mentioned yucatan, I buy this sauce called el yucateco xxxtra hot mayan recipe, great stuff. The local asian market imports it. Is this from where you speak of?
 
Lol omri, it's probably not the same as you're used to over here. I usually go with chillie sauce over bbq, I never touched the garlic sauce back in the single days either.
 
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