'Shut the cluck up!' How chefs bring the hottest levels to Nashville hot chicken

We all know about hot chicken, but what about those extra hot heat levels? Like the "hella" hot at Helen's Hot Chicken? Or the "damn hot!!" or the "shut the cluck up!!!" at Hattie B's?

Who eats that? And why? What's on it that makes it that hot? What happens when people eat it? (Sometimes, it gets really funny.) And can you actually medically hurt yourself if you're pounding down XXX hot chicken?

Longtime East Nashville chicken shack Bolton's had a warning sign that says, "Please wash your hands before rubbing your eyes or babies. ... Chose your spice level at your own risk!"

You gotta wonder, that can't be safe, can it?

We got you some answers to all these questions — and we even had a couple of Tennessean staffers try the extra-hot hot chicken. They probably should get hazard pay.

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The few, the brave, the wounded?

Hot chicken shack owners told us the preponderance of those ordering extra heat levels love the thrill and/or love showing off to friends. The restaurateurs, after delivering warnings, usually just step back and shake their heads — and sometimes laugh their heads off at what happens next.

There's the Hendersonville fireman who ate XXX-hot chicken at Moore's Spicy Fried Chicken and stripped down to his undershirt after pouring a bottle of water on top of his head, restaurant owner David Moore said.

"That may be the funniest thing I've seen," Moore said.

Then there was the guy with dreadlocks piled on top of his head who ate the 900 degrees — three levels higher than the "hot" — at 400 Degrees in Bordeaux earlier this year.

"He looked at me, he took his [dreads] down and he shook them — and he exited the building!" owner Aqui Hines said. "He left his food, his to-go orders, everything, and never returned. That tells you how hot it is."

What's it like to eat extra hot chicken?

Symptoms often include burning in the mouth, lips and gut, head sweat, watering eyes, runny noses, drooling mouths and ringing in the ears. Most folks overwhelmed by extra hot chicken usually just rush into the bathroom and stay there awhile, Hines and Moore said.

"Mild has a little spice. Medium has a kick. Hot means hot, but as my customers say, an enjoyable hot," Moore said. "I tell everybody, once you go into the Xs, you're on your own."

"The Carolina Reaper is the hottest pepper in the world," Hines said. "Can you imagine what that does internally? It's gonna melt your insides. This is where heat meets flavor, and you could possibly explode!"

"Oh god, it just keeps getting worse!" said Tennessean investigative reporter Kelly Puente after a couple of bites of 900 degree-level heat at 400 Degrees.

"It's very deceptive because you take that initial bite and you're like, oh, it's not that bad," she said, wiping her nose, "and then your tongue starts burning."

Tennessean marketing manager Jordon Washington, who also ate the hottest of the hot, agrees that it sneaks up on ya. "Have you ever pre-heated an oven?" he said, laughing. "That's what it feels like."

What's in that hot, hot chicken anyway?

Most chicken shack cooks keep their spices a secret, but Aqui Hines of 400 Degrees revealed she uses the hottest pepper that's commercially available in making her highest heat level chicken.

The hot chicken has ground habanero; the next level up, or the 500 degrees chicken, adds ghost pepper spice, often cited as more than 100 times hotter than Tabasco sauce, to the mix. For the next level up, cooks add scorpion ghost pepper, which is twice as hot as regular ghost pepper, Hines said.

For the highest heat level, 400 Degrees adds Carolina Reaper — anywhere from 10% to 30% hotter than scorpion ghost pepper — to the chicken, Hines said.

"You're gonna f*****g explode!" Hines shouted and laughed.

Could you actually hurt yourself?

Even after eating the hottest hot chicken, though, you should be OK — after the pain subsides, anyway.

Doctors say anyone with tears in the esophagus or anywhere else in the digestive tract needs to stay away from hot chicken or most any other really spicy food, for that matter.

For the rest of us?

"Though hot chicken can cause immense pain, the pain will last for about 20 seconds, and you're doing no long-term damage to your body in that time," said Dr. Rishi D. Naik, a gastroenterologist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.

In fact, the capsaicin included in hotter spices can be good for you; capsaicin can increase metabolism and aid in weight loss.

So if your doctor gives you grief about eating too much hot chicken, you can fire back that it'll help you lose weight.

Have any intense or funny or wild hot chicken stories? Find Brad Schmitt at brad@tennessean.com or 615-259-8384.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: Nashville hot chicken: How hot is hot chicken and is it safe?