There are a lot of menus across the United States with hot chicken as one of the items, but there is no hot chicken like hot chicken in Nashville! I’ve tried hot chicken in lots of places and places that boast they are part of a Nashville hot chicken family, but I’m not only not convinced but state very clearly they cannot compare!
We were in Nashville recently and visited the original hot chicken restaurant, Prince’s Hot Chicken. The family lore says it all began with Thornton Prince, who was “tall, handsome, and good-looking,” according to his great-niece, André Prince Jeffries. “Even in the height of the Great Depression, Thornton Prince knew how to have a good time. He enjoyed the nightlife and had a well-earned reputation as being quite the ladies’ man,” the restaurant’s About Us page explains.
The story goes that he stepped out on his lady one Saturday night. So on Sunday morning, she doused his fried chicken with a heap of hot pepper. But instead of punishment, he loved it and opened his first restaurant which he called the BBQ Chicken Shack – although the chicken was hot, not barbequed. It moved around to several locations and in 1989 André Prince Jeffries continued the legacy by opening the iconic East Nashville location and renaming it in the family name.
There are several levels of hot to choose from and that’s a good thing as most people aren’t up to their hottest level – xxxhot. I’m a medium girl myself. They are very particular about how it is served. Always with a dill pickle with a hint of vinegar and on a piece of white bread placed under the chicken to soak up the wonderful juice. And while their specialty is hot chicken, they serve a strawberry cake which my family fondly calls “pink cake” which is a great way to counter some of the hotness of the chicken. There is usually a line of both locals and people from all over the world, but I promise the time will be well spent.
