What is the Best Way to Relieve Spice?

Isabelle
Apr 19
4 min read

On a recent viewing of the show Hot Ones, where celebrities eat wings that get progressively spicier while being interviewed. As the wings continue to get spicier and the Scoville level passes 40,000, I can feel my own throat and skin radiating with heat as I continue watching them even though I’m not the one eating the wings. More so, I sympathize with the urge for celebrities to grab a bottle of milk to drown out the heat. That urge was the moment I grew interested in why milk relieves the spicy sensation. Why is milk so effective at removing the pain, and what other foods are able to do the same?

Chemical Properties of Milk

To first understand why milk is so powerful at calming down the pain from spice, it is important to discuss its composition. Milk, especially whole milk, contains fats and a protein called casein, which constitutes about 80% of the total protein in the drink (“Casein” 2026). Additionally casein is an amphiphilic substance that contains both hydrophilic (water-loving and polar) and hydrophobic (water-fearing and nonpolar) ends (Griffiths, 2015).

How Milk Reduces Spicy Sensations

The reason why milk is so good at removing the spicy taste from our mouths is because the hydrophobic ends of casein and the nonpolar fats can attract and dissolve the capsaicin molecules, or the primary active compounds in chili peppers that give them their spicy sensation (Acapulcos, 2012), which are also nonpolar and hydrophobic (Griffiths, 2015). You can think of casein and fats as soap that washes the pain receptors and cleans the mouth from the capsaicin. This is also the reason why skim milk, fat free milks, or plant-based milks do not relieve the spice as much as whole milk, which has an abundance of casein and fat molecules (Why Does Milk Help with Spice?, n.d.).

Figure 1. Casein molecules pulling capsaicin molecules from the pain receptors in the mouth, ameliorating the spicy sensation (Chillies: Hot but Very Cool, n.d.). — Figure 1. Casein molecules pulling capsaicin molecules from the pain receptors in the mouth, ameliorating the spicy sensation (*Chillies: Hot but Very Cool*, n.d.).

How Other Substances Influence Spice Perception

There are several other substances that can help relieve the pain in ways similar and distinct from milk. Because of milk’s effectiveness, it is no surprise that other dairy products high in fat and casein like yogurt, ice cream, and sour cream also reduce spiciness. Sugary, non-fizzy drinks, while not as effective as dairy products, can help reduce the spice through a phenomenon called mixture suppression. Mixture suppression is a product of the sugary sensation overpowering or dampening the pain of the spice (What Makes Spice Go Away, 2026), making sugary drinks like Kool-aid effective in reducing spice. You can think of sugar acting like a distractor to the pain.

On the opposite end, other substances actually exacerbate the pain from spiciness. One example is water. Because water is a polar solvent and lacks the casein and fat composition as milk, it cannot remove capsaicin from the pain receptors in the mouth. Rather its immiscibility, or inability to mix with non-polar capsaicin, actually spreads capsaicin around the mouth, leading to an even more irritable sensation (Dand, 2023). Even worse than water is sparkling or carbonated water. In the previous paragraph, it was emphasized that sugary, non-fizzy drinks would help relieve pain because fizziness can cancel out the pain relief from the sugar. Fizzy drinks, specifically sparkling water, also spreads capsaicin throughout the mouth, but it is strengthened by the carbonation. The carbonation can also irritate inflamed tissues in the mouth, causing the pain to increase dramatically (ScienceShot, n.d.).

Figure 2. Spectrum of drinks that are the best through worst at mitigating the milk sensation (Boyd, 2019).

Key Takeaways

It is so interesting to see the effects of how different fluids create polar differences in how prominent the spicy sensation is in the mouth. Additionally, it's also fascinating to see how chemical properties completely rewire the effectiveness of a drink. Now, when I turn on Hot Ones and I imagine eating the wings with the celebrities, I can thank the host for recommending milk instead of water. And, most importantly, I can thank my genetics that I’m not lactose intolerant!