Some Like it Hot

English food is bland and boring? Maybe, but Britons are physically addicted to Indian curry dishes, says Professor Stephen Gray of Nottingham Trent University. He monitored the reactions of more than 100 people to different foods and found that the anticipation of a typical British dish like steak and kidney pie resulted in a 1.8-point rise in blood pressure, but the anticipation of a good hot curry raised the blood pressure by 4.9 points. “Traditional British foods fail to do this due to the basic flavor combinations,” Gray says. “When we crave a curry it seems our taste buds are literally crying out for stimulation.” (AFP) ...Addiction counselors are offering suffering Brits the new “salsa patch.”