I’d been throwing around an idea for a while with Racer K and we found that moving was the perfect excuse to finally do it: a hot chicken tasting party!
If you aren’t familiar with the term “hot chicken” and not from Nashville, you may just think I’m talking about some sort of spicy chicken but this is something different. The history is a little muddy but was possibly introduced around the 1930s from the Prince family, owners of Prince’s Hot Chicken. In the last few years, hot chicken has exploded in Nashville. Even Thomas Keller stopped at Prince’s while he was in town. This is a form of fried chicken, typically pan fried in lard and heavily seasoned a particular degree of heat, ranging from mild (WUSS!) to extra extra hot (YOU’RE CRAZY!). The only person I’ve know who can handle the extra extra hot and then some is my dear friend, Naresh. Being from India doesn’t hurt his adaptation to this level of heat that would probably have sent me to the hospital.
So, we invited some friends by with a dual purpose: to compare different restaurants’ version of hot chicken and to polish off our beer cellar contents that won’t be making the move to Colorado. We advised our friends to pick a hot chicken joint and grab whatever they’d like, advising though to perhaps keep it to hot and medium heats so everyone could try their offerings. The restaurants chosen were Bolton’s, Pepperfire, and Hattie B’s.
After getting the house cleaned up, I also got myself cleaned up.
Then we got the table set up. Yes, those are leftover items from our Christmas party.
Three restaurants represented in hot and medium plus homemade macaroni and cheese and coleslaw, plus I made a honey cake for dessert. The bread and pickles are the most common accoutrement for hot chicken. They help cool the burning mouth plus they both taste great when they’ve also soaked up some of the spices of the chicken.
Once everything was assembled, we set to eating and drinking. As I said, the goal was to clear out our beer cellar so we did each beer as a tasting. This is both a great way to have many different beers in one night and to get quickly inebriated without realizing it because you never have a full glass.
I think we did pretty well, as you can see from the picture, but we still have some beer left to go before the move.
As usual, we are terrible about taking pictures during our parties because we get so caught up in being present with our guests. It’s so nice when no one has a cell phone in hand and every one is talking, eating and drinking!
All in all, the party was a great success and one aspect that is expected of hot chicken at this point is the pain the day after. Let’s just say, this meal gets you coming and going. So, yesterday I relaxed and tried to get to feeling better… but still nibbled on some of the leftovers. Because I’m a masochist.