Initiation

1. Pick a good, trustworthy chicken joint.

There are rules for eating hot chicken, you see.

Nashville and Memphis have been in longstanding competition over a slew of superlatives: best live music scene, best food, best people. I’m from Memphis, and I’ll go to my grave saying Memphis barbeque beats anything Nashville has to offer. Sure, Nashville puts up a fight in some categories. Any travel blog or restaurant review site will tell you it’s the place for hot chicken, and they’ve got Memphis beat on the range of local spots.

Still, I’ve got some pity for people from Nashville. It must be tough to be not quite close enough to top-notch barbeque and Beale Street’s singing blocks of jazz bars, Memphis Grizzlies basketball and breweries full of people who know their way around this city. But if you’re from Nashville and you love hot chicken, congratulations, you’ve got something on us. You’re never very far from a counter serving up sides in shallow styrofoam cups, white bread oranged with bubbling oil and spice. Baskets lined with checkered paper and steaming seasoned fries. Reddish breaded chicken dressed with pepper and pickles.

I get carried away just thinking about it.

I’m not saying you have to go to Nashville for the best of the best. Other cities might just require a little more research to make sure you’re doing it right. My advice: head somewhere with a name. A real person’s name. There’s just something about restaurants named after people. Someone was proud enough of their food to put their name beside it, like an artist’s signature. Someone was committed enough from the start to prematurely stamp their legacy on the business, and to claim their restaurant as part of the family. Grandaddy’s in Nashville has a nice ring to it. Bishop’s, Bolton’s, or the world-famous Hattie B’s will do. If the restaurant name doesn’t conjure an image of a beer-bellied man licking his fingers, look elsewhere.

In Memphis, we’ve got Gus’s. Gus’s history dates back to the 1950s when a Tennessee couple sold homemade chicken out of a tavern. Their son Gus inherited the recipe after they died, then perfected it and brought it to fame under his name. A big fan of his chicken worked with the family to learn the recipe and open an official restaurant on Memphis’s Front Street. If you’re wondering what makes this chicken so special, that’s Gus’s secret. He said it himself: “This is a dead man’s recipe [and] I ain’t telling.”

While plenty of locations have opened since then, there’s something special about the striped awning, brick facade, and bright yellow sign greeting customers at the downtown joint.

2. Order the right thing.

No matter who you are, order your chicken bone-in. White or dark depends on personal preference. For me, it’s always three-piece dark — two thighs, one leg. You can’t go wrong with sides. Fries and mac never disappoint. To drink, sweet tea. Or beer.

I used to hate spicy food. I don’t exactly remember why. Maybe I tried it when I was too young to handle the heat. That’s unlikely, though, as I was a pretty risk-averse eater. I justified the distaste with an argument I thought was logical enough as a kid. Why would I voluntarily eat something that burns, makes my nose water, and generally makes my food less enjoyable? I might as well have said I was allergic to flavor; it would have sounded just as ridiculous to any Memphian.

The truth is that I wanted to like it. I was envious of the three boys in my family who happily opted for spice whenever it was offered. Their penchant for it was one of many things I was not a part of. My two older brothers, Jack and Rob, ate their spicy dishes with Daddy and talked about basketball. I stayed quiet. Beyond the major details of the Grizzlies starting lineup, my sports knowledge was limited at best.

I stayed out of their way, too, when they would play games in the backyard. I watched them toss cornhole bags from one Vanderbilt-decorated board to another University of Tennessee one. When Jack and Rob aimed toy guns at each other in front of the house, I watched from the window. I was too young for their TV shows, too girly for their video games, too sensitive for their spicy fried chicken. And I was envious. I wanted to be a part of their club, their conversations, their laughter. Eating, I decided, was my way in. My plan was to follow after Rob the next time we ordered Gus’s, asking for the same thing he ordered. I’d pace myself with the boys, eating down to soiled styrofoam. I’d sip water when one of them sipped water. Most importantly, I wouldn’t complain about the spice.

3. Get comfortable to enjoy the meal. Eat outside if it’s nice.

I remember the day the boys taught me how to eat it, how to handle the spice. Daddy opened the front door that afternoon with his pointer finger and thumb, balancing a stack of squeaking styrofoam with his hands and forearms. They’d ordered it to-go from Gus’s with a box for me too. Gus’s doesn’t do mild; if I wanted to eat, I’d have to deal with the spice. I claimed my steaming box and followed them out the front door. Rob took a seat on one of the white rocking chairs on our front porch, and my Daddy claimed the other. They balanced their sweet tea on the armrests while I placed mine on the brick porch. I took a seat on a white bench swinging between columns. Cautiously, I placed the meal in my lap.

Rob and Daddy got right to it, staining their fingers orange with cayenne, chili, paprika. It would be days before the insides of their fingernails would lose the color and smell. They toned down spice with fries or washed it with sweet tea. I was hesitant, testing the flavor with seasoned fries from one of the two smaller compartments.

Here’s what they taught me:

4. Eat it hot. Lose the cutlery and the napkins.

The only appropriate time to use a fork is when you need to release some steam. Pick up the thigh from the edge, where it won’t burn your finger. Stick a fork in the meaty portion and pull it down. Try to keep a good ratio of breading to chicken. Once you’ve taken off a few big pieces and let some steam go, you won’t need the fork anymore.

Now, pick it up with your hands. Don’t worry about the mess; that’s a problem for later. You’ll have to bite around, and possibly into, some bone and gristle. That’s alright. Bone-in chicken is one of those foods you have to work a little for. Like shelled pistachios, or shrimps with their tails still intact. That’s a good thing; it makes the taste all the more rewarding.

At this point, your hands will start to get messy. There’s no use for a napkin until you’re done because your hands are just going to get dirty again.

5. Don’t take too many breaks. That’s when the spice hits.

There’s a science to it. Hot chicken is loaded with capsaicin, the spicy stuff in cayenne and chili. When that red powder touches your tongue, capsaicin induces a burning feeling. Some people offset the burn with milk, beer, ice cubes. I learned to deal with it. Rip off the Band-Aid. I’m not saying this is the right way to do it. In fact, WikiHow or a social media page might tell you differently. There’s something to be said about eating slowly, savoring the spice, building tolerance. But this is how I did it that day on the white bench, and it’s how I’ll always do it.  I let the spice settle in once I’m done, then get back to those small compartments filled with fries. I take a few bites of white bread if I have to.

6. Eat it all. It won’t be as good the next day.

The day I learned to eat hot chicken, I didn’t leave anything in my box but bone and bread crust. I observed the boys and followed unspoken instructions, eating the chicken first and then the fries. I stopped talking for a few minutes while the spice settled in. Took a few breaths, a few eager gulps of sweet tea. I went back for the last few crunchy pieces of breading, then licked my fingers clean, as I’d seen the boys do. Rob and Daddy didn’t tell me they were proud. They didn’t need to. I was a part of this small ritual, and that was enough for me.

7. Enjoy your hot chicken with good company.

There’s no science to this one. It just tastes better that way.

Now that my siblings and I are older, our family rarely ends up in Memphis at the same time. When we do, there most likely will be a meal from Gus’s. Daddy will come in with a stack of boxes; someone will open them and call out what they see so everyone can claim one. We bring our boxes to the table. Daddy prays over them with as much grace and gusto as he’d pray over a Christmas Eve dinner: “God, thank you for this day, thank you for your many blessings, and bless this food to the nourishment of our bodies. In Christ’s name, Amen.”

To simulate a home-cooked meal, my mom pours our drinks into glasses. After all, we’re not animals. The first few minutes are silent except for our crunching and slurping. My mom orders chicken tenders, and the boys and I make fun of her for ordering boneless meat from a hot chicken place. She starts cutting them slowly with a knife and fork while the rest of us dig in with our hands. When she needs a napkin, she’ll have to reach over my brother’s plate and interrupt his meal. He’ll drop his two raised elbows, maybe even lick his forefinger and thumb clean and grab one for her. I don’t bother with the napkins. The boys taught me better than that.

At the end of the meal, Jack, Rob, Daddy, and I will hold our hands up and inspect the orange of our oil-stained fingertips. And I will laugh, proudly, about how everyone we see tomorrow will know what we ate for dinner.

Kate is an essayist from Memphis, TN, which is to say her favorite food is barbeque. She studied English and Education at UNC Chapel Hill, which is to say her favorite color is Carolina blue. Her literary inspirations include Barbara Kingsolver and Marilynne Robinson.