It burns, burns, burns...

I'm sidelined.

Ian and I are having a couple of friends over tonight. We're making tamales, "cowboy caviar" (a black-eyed pea salsa), truffles, and salsa verde. Damn that salsa verde.

You see, salsa verde contains serrano chiles. Vicious, vicious little chiles.

If you ever work with chiles, wear rubber gloves and/or wash your hands 30 times after touching them.

Why? Because if you happen to chop onions after, and your nose starts to run, and you blow your nose, you could end up with vicious chile juice burning the tender skin around your nose. No fun.

The upside: I found some solutions for this predicament.

For immediate, short-term relief: rub it with butter or milk (fat counters the burn).
Water just makes it worse! However, ice does do well to numb it.
Lemon juice does nothing, despite what you'll read on the internet.
Rubbing alcohol burns at first, but after about a minute, you'll feel relieved.

Vigilance! Never let this happen to you! But if it does...at least you'll know what to do.