Tex-Mex vs. Mex

When I was in college, I studied abroad in Mexico. On my first day with my new host family, they offered me some salsa with my lunch. Being from Texas, I considered myself to be a connoisseur of spicy foods, particularly Tex-Mex food, which I figured was the same as Mexican food, anyway.

I heaped a spoonful of the salsa onto my rice, took a huge mouthful, and promptly began to cough uncontrollably. I gulped water, to no avail, and could only sit there as red as a beet, with tears in my eyes, as my host family stared at me. "It was spicier than I expected," I managed to gasp.

In spite of my frightful first experience with Mexican spices, I didn't learn my lesson. A few months later, I found some chipotle peppers in my host family's fridge. I'd eaten sandwiches with the same peppers and thought they were quite tasty. So I popped a whole one into my mouth.

My immediate thought was that I was either going blind or passing out. I groped for a napkin and spit it out, tongue aflame.

Nowadays, I don’t eat chipotles by themselves, and I use salsa very sparingly.

-Rebecca from Texas