Why Some Foods Make You Sweat

[ackeiyword]

Can certain foods make you sweat more?
Bite into a nuclear hot wing and see how long it takes for those little beads of sweat to pop up on your forehead. The heat you're feeling comes from capsaicin -- a chemical found in the hot peppers used to make your wings.
Capsaicin stimulates nerve receptors in your mouth and essentially "tricks" your nervous system into thinking you're hot. Your body acts much like it does when you're outside in 90-degree heat. Your internal thermostat -- the hypothalamus in your brain -- sends out a signal to activate your sweat glands. Sweat reaches your skin and evaporates, taking the heat from your body with it.
Foods that are hot temperature-wise can also make you sweat. "Hot coffee, hot tea, and hot soups can sometimes make people sweat, even though their whole core body temperature isn't hot," says Dee Anna Glaser, MD, professor of dermatology at St. Louis University School of Medicine and president of the International Hyperhidrosis Society.

 

[marklee]

The answer hinges on the fact that spicy foods excite the receptors in the skin that normally respond to heat. Those receptors are pain fibers, technically known as polymodal nociceptors. They respond to temperature extremes and to intense mechanical stimulation, such as pinching and cutting; they also respond to certain chemical influences.
The central nervous system can be confused or fooled when these pain fibers are stimulated by a chemical, like that in chile peppers, which triggers an ambiguous neural response.

 

[xhayatox]

Maybe if they require much use of your jaw?

 

[RobPhillips79]

That's good information. I always thought it was because I was actually getting hotter...