Kitchen Laboratory

After the disappointing end to my attempt at cooking corned beef, I was left with a head of cabbage on my hands and no idea how to use it.  Fortunately the next day one of my co-workers brought a corned beef and cabbage salad to work.  It is actually a prize-winning recipe for the annual Napa Valley mustard festival.  I thought it delicious, so she gave me the recipe.  On Wednesday I got to try it out.  It turned out beautifully!  It calls for corned beef, raw cabbage, cooked green beans, boiled potatoes and a mustard vinaigrette.  I used ham instead of corned beef and it tasted wonderful.  There was one nebulous item in the vinaigrette ingredients: a certain type of chili.  The woman who gave me the recipe said she's never found it in any grocery store.  So it must some elite product.  The only problem is neither of us knew if it was chili powder, chili sauce, or just bottled chiles.  I used chili powder when making the vinaigrette.  Then I remembered some packets of chili sauce left over from a trip to Panda Express.  I opened one and poured it all over the salad I had on my plate.  It tasted wonderful and boy, did it add some kick!  After about five minutes I began trying everything I could think of to quench the burning in my mouth.  It was my own version of Mythbusters.  To my sadness I found that, while bread is excellent for absorbing the heat from Chinese mustard and horseradish--the heat that sears your sinuses--it has no effect on chiles, which tends to burn the mouth and throat.  Milk was the only thing that brought relief; but even that was only temporary.  The heat in my mouth and throat continued for some fifteen minutes after I finished dinner.  I guess I'll remember next time to go easy on the chili sauce.