Welcome

The Spicy Club was born from a shared obsession. At Lostium, our studio in Madrid, we’re tech people, science people and kitchen people; but the one thing we all agree on, no argument, is that we are hopeless spicy lovers. Years ago we registered this domain dreaming of a Spanish-speaking community around spice. This is, at last, that dream turned into this digital guide.

“No chillies, no revolution.”

attributed to Mao Zedong

We’re not here to lecture you (well… a little lecturing).

Spicy Universe is the explainer part: where chiles come from, why they burn and which varieties populate the planet. The genus Capsicum has been grown in the Americas for over 6,000 years, and it was Columbus who took it to Europe in 1493. It hasn’t stopped conquering kitchens since. Today China grows more than half the world’s chiles.

What you’ll discover

• Why capsaicin concentrates in the chile’s placenta and not the seeds (yes, you’ve been told wrong your whole life).
• Why milk puts out the blaze better than water.
• Where the pesky Scoville scale comes from and how heat is measured.