I RECENTLY spent an evening with some friends at a Thai restaurant in Faringdon.

I carefully scanned the menu, making note of the number of chillies pictured beside each dish to ensure I wouldn’t end up eating something that burnt my tastebuds off.

One of our dining companions, on the other hand, actually has an arrangement with the staff that they ignore the chilli scale on the menu and go as spicy as they can.

The staff served him a red curry which they happily admitted even they would struggle to finish and he cleaned the bowl.

I've spent a few years building up my tolerance to spicy food and I’m still only able to cope with a two-chilli dish but I can understand how people can get addicted to eating spicier and spicier foods.

It is capsaicinoids, a collection of chemicals found inside the chilli, that give them their heat.

These chemicals bind with pain receptors in the mouth and throat which then send a message to the brain that you’ve eaten something hot. The brain then reacts by increasing your heart rate, perspiration and releasing endorphins which give you a natural 'high'.

Most of the peppers you can think of are likely to come from one species, Capsicum annuum, which contains cultivars that are both mild and hot, from bell peppers to jalapeños.

Their level of heat is measured on the Scoville scale: a bell pepper has a Scoville heat unit of zero, a jalapeno pepper is about 8,000 and the Bird’s Eye chilli is about 225,000.

Chillies also have different culinary functions: some, usually the small ones, simply add heat, whereas the larger fleshier ones add flavour as well.

I've been taking an interest in chillies recently as Cultivate have just taken on a new supplier in the form of the Oxfordshire Chilli Garden.

Based in Eynsham, they grow and sell fresh and dried chillies and their own spice blends.

I usually like to try out all our new products, but I'm not sure my two-chilli palate is going to cut it when testing these out: I think I'll take it as an opportunity to improve my tolerance.