I second that observation.

So much of the fun of chile peppers is their individuality- no two people react exactly the same way or have the same dfinitions of hot. It *could* make sense though that sauces might seem hotter when cold as capsaicin is very easy volitalized, as evidenced by the family leaving the house when you stir fry chiles. Less would become airborne if the sauce were cold. Of course, another argument could be made that they’d be hotter if hotter as the mouth would be much more sensitive to capsaicin if undergoing a good episode of ‘pizza burn’.

And the ‘keep refrigerated’ admonition is just to keep the lawyers happy. Very few commercially made hot sauces will go ‘bad’ if left unrefrigerated for short periods but they will certainly look ‘bad’ due to oxidative browning. You know, you take a bite out of an apple & come back ten minutes later & it looks terrible. Essentially it has ‘rusted’, ie ‘oxidized’. Most of your preservatives (sodium benzoate, potassium sorbate, etc) are first and foremost effective because they are also strong anti-oxidants.

Yeah, I’ve noticed that too!

When capsaicin enters your system, it interacts with a special receptor type called Vanilloid Receptor 1 (VR1) which results in the “painful” feeling of “spiciness”. VR1 however also responds to heat stimulus, and both spicy and heated foods feel “hot” because they are both detected on the same receptor. This means that warm spicy food will feel even “hotter” than cooled spicy food since it is an additive effect.

So in reality, its the opposite of what you notice. Maybe you didnt shake the bottle enough the first or second time.

-AJ

I have noticed on the oposite end of this spectrum, that when added to high temerature foods such as soup hot sauces seem to be less spicy. In response to this i generally let soups cool a bit before eating them in order to enjoy the spice. So despite any receptor interactions, my real world experience tends to concur with the “colder is hotter” assumption.

Rob