No doubt if you have consumed any hot peppers or food spiced with hot pepper you have experienced a burning sensation in your mouth accompanied by sweating.  The sweating is a result of your body trying to cool itself down, thinking that you mouth is on fire.  Scientists call this non-exercise thermogenesis (the process of heat production in organisms) and non-exercise thermogenesis causes the body to increase its metabolic rate and thus consumption of calories.  Hot peppers, all things equal, can cause a body to burn more calories by doing nothing more than eating them. Hot peppers can increase the metabolic rate of an individual by about 30% and can last for about 5 hours post consumption.  To illustrate the potential of this phenomenon let us look at a typical example.  A lightly active 38 year old male will burn about 2200 calories per day. Caloric intake in excess of 2200 without a corresponding increase in activity will tend to cause weight gain proportional to the excess calories consumed.   By consuming hot peppers, this male can cause his body to burn an additional 600 calories without increasing activity.  Research has shown that the addition of hot pepper containing Capsaicinoids (pungent principles of hot peppers) to meals significantly increased the body’s heat production (calorie burning) and lipid oxidation particularly in high fat [1].   Additionally, the addition of hot pepper to meals decreases the appetite of subjects for up to 24 hours [2].  It is clear that hot peppers can and possibly will find their way into a new diet plan in the near future.   Paul Bosland of the Chile Pepper Institute has created a very interesting video on the subject.

[1] Yoshioka, M. et al., Effects of red pepper added to high-fat and high-carbohydrate meals on energy metabolism and substrate utilization in Japanese women (1998) British Journal of Nutrition 80, 503-510

[2] Yoshioka, M. et al., Effects of red pepper on appetite and energy intake (1999) British Journal of Nutrition 82, 115-123