Hopewell Valley Student Podcasting NetworkChemistry ConnectionsThe Chemistry of Chipotle Episode #2 Welcome to Chemistry Connections, my name is Maxxe Rice and I am your host for episode #2 called The Chemistry of Chipotle Today I will be discussing the best food known to man, Chipotle. Segment 1: Introduction to Chipotle For the first segment I will be discussing an introduction to what Chipotle is. For those who don't know, Chipotle is the best fast food restaurant chain that serves Mexican inspired cuisine. They are infamous for their delicious burritos, bowls, quesadillas, chips and guacamole. The restaurant is set up when you are ordering in an assembly line style in which you customize your burrito, bowl, or whatever you are choosing to get as you go down the line with workers scooping the ingredients for you. They go by their motto at chipotle that, “Real is better. Better for You, Better for People, Better for Our Planet.” They make their food fresh every day because of their motto and they use no artificial flavors, colors, or preservatives, no freezers, can openers, or shortcuts… I know I wouldn't want to work there either, it seems like a lot of work. But really that's what makes them so good they are committed to their amazing food and they only use 53 real ingredients. There is also an extreme debate about how to pronounce Chipotle especially with my grandparents and I. My grandma calls it Chi-poat-lee, my other grandma calls it Chi-pot-te but all of those are wrong. The correct way to say chipotle is Chih-poat-lay. Segment 2: The Chemistry Behind ChipotleNow you know what chipotle is, let's dive into some of the science behind this outstanding food. Specifically starting with: a common ingredient in chipotles renowned known guacamole, tomato red chili salsa, fresh tomato salsa, roasted chili corn salsa, honey vinaigrette, tomatillo green chili salsa, and so many other foods that chipotle has that if I said all of them I would be talking for almost 5 minutes. One ingredient that all of these foods have in common is some type of pepper. These peppers also have something in common as well… SPICEEEEEEE. This is where the chemistry comes in…. Because well the spicy flavor that you taste with some of chipotle's food is due to a spice molecule named capsaicin…. I know what you may be thinking capsa what?! Yes you heard it right, capsaicin. Capsaicin is my cool friend that basically has active chemical superpowers. Capsaicin, the molecular formula of C18H27NO3, is an organic molecule which is made up of a benzene ring with a long hydrophobic carbon tail and a polar amide group. Now let's take a further look into the actual structure of the molecule because that sounds really confusing. A benzene ring is a ring formation of six carbon atoms which are bonded together and have alternating single and double bonds between them. The long hydrophobic carbon tail means essentially a chain of carbon atoms bonded together with surrounding hydrogen atoms around them bonded to each carbon on the chain. The polar amide group is the part of the molecule where there is a nitrogen atom and a double bonded oxygen atom. We can break this...
