Talk:Pungency

Old lede

Pungency is the condition of having a strong, sharp smell or flavor that is often so strong that it is unpleasant.[1][2] Pungency is the technical term used by scientists to refer to the characteristic of food commonly referred to as spiciness or hotness and sometimes heat,[3][4][5] which is found in foods such as chili peppers.

The term piquancy /ˈpiːkənsi/ is sometimes applied to foods with a lower degree of pungency[2] that are "agreeably stimulating to the palate." Examples of piquant food include mustard and curry. The terms "pungent" /pʌndʒənt/ (About this sound listen) and "pungency" are rarely used in colloquial speech but are preferred by scientists as they eliminate the potential ambiguity arising from use of the words "hot" and "spicy", which can also refer to temperature and the presence of spices, respectively.[3][4][6]

For instance, a pumpkin pie can be both hot (out of the oven) and spicy (due to the common inclusion of spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, mace, and cloves), but it is not pungent. (A food critic may nevertheless use the word "piquant" to describe such a pie, especially if it is exceptionally well-seasoned.) Conversely, pure capsaicin is pungent, yet it is not naturally accompanied by a hot temperature or spices.

As the Oxford, Collins, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries explain, the term "piquancy" refers to mild pungency[2] and flavors and spices that are much less strong than chilli peppers, including, for example, the strong flavor of some tomatoes. In other words, pungency always refers to a very strong taste whereas piquancy refers to any spices and foods that are "agreeably stimulating to the palate", in other words to food that is spicy in the general sense of "well-spiced".

                        RaymondStarWars (talk) 04:18, 8 April 2018 (UTC)RaymondStarWars

Confusing

Piquant and piquance is more used to describe a tart or acidic aspect to food. piquancy is used to describe the hot affect of food. I think we should clarify this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 63.204.130.177 (talk) 18:42, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. This sentence is nonsensical "...piquancy /ˈpiːkənsi/ is sometimes used to refer to a lower degree of pungency (than that of chilli) such as that of mustard, but it more often refers to mild pungency..." and the dictionary link following it does not support the idea that it tries to convey. The *multiple* incorrectly incorporated dictionary links in the later paragraph about piquancy also do not support the idea of piquancy as the ideal amount of capsaicin. All reference to piquancy should be removed from this article.

Further, in the terminology section, it is incorrect to say that "pungent" is not common in non-specialist English. It is very common. However, it is almost never used with the specialized meaning with which this article deals. The most common food collocations for pungent in the Corpus of Contemporary American English are cheese, garlic, and herbs. The wording could better reflect this distinction. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 185.5.154.82 (talk) 03:41, 16 July 2014 (UTC)

Move?

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the requested move was: The consensus is to rename the article per the above move request

Piquance → Pungency –

• "Pungency" is the correct technical term used by scientists: http://www.pnas.org/content/105/33/11808.abstract http://rspb.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/279/1735/2012.full http://www.chilepepperinstitute.org/files/tiny_mce/file_manager/educ_info/Chile%20Terminology.pdf "Piquance" is nonsense because it's so rare that it's not even in most dictionaries. All dictionaries have "piquancy" and the examples and definitions of "piquancy" and "pungency" clearly show that "pungency" is correct and "piquancy" is something else. (See www.onelook.com) Espoo (talk) 16:15, 9 September 2012 (UTC)

Support, but not purely because pungency is the "technical term". I think of the two pungency is more used than piquancy and, as noted, piquancy is such a rare term that it can have different meanings. As the article describes, piquancy can be used to refer to foods that a mildy spicy. I think you were a bit hasty in changing the lead/introduction. I'd favour both terms being used, and I've amended it. -- Peter ^{Talk to me} 19:37, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

As can be seen here, the article was moved to this title from "pungency" with little more than an edit summary. Piquance was created earlier and, as stated by the creater of that article, "it always refers to a FORM of pungence, but pungence doesn't necessarily refer to taste/piquance and they're not synonymous; moved some content there". -- Peter ^{Talk to me} 20:15, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

• Piquance → Pungency (move) – See resolved request. Common and technical name. Peter ^{Talk to me} 19:49, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Spicy food doesn't kill taste buds

Myth Debunked: Spicy Food Doesn't Really Kill Taste Buds. Anybody has some academic info on this? Komitsuki (talk) 16:15, 3 November 2012 (UTC)

Old page history

Some old history that used to be at the title "Pungency" has been moved to Talk:Pungency/Old history. The old talk page can be found at Talk:Pungency/Old talk page. Graham87 10:29, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

Not really "Smell" and "Taste"

The first paragraph refers to pungency being about smell and taste, yet the section on Mechanism that links to the article on Chemesthesis implies the process is not about smell (olfactory receptors) and taste (mouth receptors), but rather about any of a number of skin receptors sensitive to the chemicals involved. The article is a challenge, since the nature of pungency is likely physiologically challenging to describe in layman's terms, and folks have been using spiciness, pungency, heat, and others interchangeable in reference to taste and smell for years. SquashEngineer (talk) 16:20, 27 September 2017 (UTC)

Only capsaicin is pungent?

Is capsaicin the only chemical responsible for pungency? This article seems solely about chili peppers. What about wasabi or durian? Nessie (talk) 18:09, 1 November 2017 (UTC)

Physiological system

The section Pungency § Mechanism describes particular biological pathways involved in human pungency detection. However, I think it needs expansion to discuss how these pathways relate to both sensory systems (eg. taste and touch) and to experience, especially the sensation of heat.

I'm looking for more information on claims like this:

By the way: the sensation of something as “hot” or “spicy” is quite often described as a taste. Technically, this is just a pain signal sent by the nerves that transmit touch and temperature sensations. The substance “capsaicin” in foods seasoned with chili causes a sensation of pain and heat.
— InformedHealth.org [Internet]. Cologne, Germany: Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG); 2006-. How does our sense of taste work? 2011 Dec 20 [Updated 2016 Aug 17]. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK279408/#i2261.hotorspicyisnotatast

Daask (talk) 20:25, 1 June 2022 (UTC)

"Picante" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Picante has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 March 10 § Picante until a consensus is reached. An anonymous username, not my real name 16:37, 10 March 2023 (UTC)