Hooray for Hot Peppers

Well, my day at the Salon du Chocolat made me realize that I have very rarely cooked anything spicy since I've arrived. Sure, I usually dump some rocoto or ají amarillo into the broth when I'm making rice, but that just gives a mild curry burn (although enough rocoto will make anything super-hot). For firey hot goodness, you need fresh, raw hot peppers with the seends still intact. Unfortunately, the only thing you can find in Paris (although I haven't checked out all the ethnic enclaves, obviously) are these piments verts (green hot peppers); they're finger-shaped peppers of the cayenne-banana-cubanelle variety, so the flesh is barely spicy at all, but the membranes and seeds add a fair bit of spice. Sadly it lacks the smoky resonance of poblano chiles, or the slightly tangy burn of jalapeños, but they'll do.

I came home from work with my mind made up: I'm making salsa, dammit. I'm also making lentils. And tomorrow, I'll fry up whatever leftover lentils I have into refried beans. I bought 3 of those finger peppers, 5 lemons, and a bell pepper (the rest of the stuff I already had at home). I made a simple onion+tomato+hot/sweet pepper salsa, with a fair bit of lemon juice and all the seeds in. Served as a salsa fresca (i.e., fresh, not yet marinated), it was a kaleidescope of all the component flavors: strong raw onion, vine-ripened tomato, sweet bell peppers, and the occasional sting of hot peppers. Whatever is left over tomorrow will hopefully meld together into a proper salsa, which I will have with my refried beans. Speaking of beans (or lentils, in this case), I tossed the other two hot peppers, sliced, into the lentils. I had already created a base of sautéed sausage, onion and garlic, but I waited until I had added the water and lentils before adding the hot peppers; I didn't want any of the capsaicin to cook out. The result was an evenly hot lentil dish that was thicker than lentil soup, but a bit too thin to be refried beans (yet). Mmmm. Everything about tonight's meal conjured up "home" for me.

Shortly after eating my meal, I remembered some of the other reasons to love hot food. Eating a lot of spicy food creates an endorphin rush, coupled with a metabolism boost. A few minutes after eating, I was in a great mood and was suddenly inspired to clean up my apartment. Hooray for "natural" self-medication!

Oh, by the way, I had totally forgotten to mention last Saturday that I had bought a bag of cacao pasta. Yes, I have a bag of dark-brown rotini that have been made with unsweetened cacao. I haven't yet decided what I'm going to do with it, but I was thinking of making chicken simmered in something creamy (maybe creme fraîche and cracked peppers). Any suggestions from the peanut gallery?