What Is Hot Chicken, And Can Carla Hall Make It The Next Cronut In New York City?
In theory, hot chicken is simple to prepare. The original Nashville dish consists of a chicken breast, thigh or wing marinated in buttermilk, breaded and sauced with a heavily spiced, cayenne pepper–based paste and pan-fried before being served with pickles over white bread. It is, however, a dish that is challenging to prepare well. Around 20 restaurants in Nashville specialize in serving renditions of hot chicken, each altering the ingredients ever-so-slightly to affect the various levels of heat that are offered (which range from overwhelmingly hot to hallucination-generating.) Prince's Hot Chicken Shack — the most storied of all the city's joints and the place generally considered to have created the dish over a half-century ago — famously guards its recipe by prohibiting camera crews anywhere near the kitchen.
Of course, we must address the biggest question on everyone's mind: how good is the chicken? At a food truck preview event yesterday, Hall offered samples of her boneless hot chicken tenders, alongside cornbread and collard greens. The chef utilizes the unorthodox ingredients of habanero and sugar as part of her hot brine. She also uses a "secret hot oil" formula that includes sweet paprika and garlic powder, which cut the traditional thick layers of cayenne pepper. Hall's version is unique in that the majority of the spice comes from this oil rather than the chicken's skin. Served dripping with healthy amounts of the hot oil (experts know to use the accompanying white bread to soak it all up), the chicken features a contemporary kick with the addition of these ingredients and prevalence of the oil. Though the chef played it safe on test day and dished out tenders best described as "mild" heat by Nashville standards, the spice mixture lingered in the mouth for a good 10 minutes after consumption. That alone is reason to consider a donation.
Bonus! Editor's top picks for hot chicken in Nashville:
- Hattie B's
112 19th Avenue South and 5209 Charlotte Pike, hattieb.com
123 Ewing Drive #3
2821 Gallatin Pike, pepperfirehotchicken.com
624 Main Street and 2309-A Franklin Pike, boltonsspicy.com
319 Peabody Street, 400degreeshotchicken.com
Read these Southern food stories on Food Republic: