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André Prince Jeffries: Hot chicken has always been the secret of Nashville. This is where it started with the Prince family.

Dan Pashman: In the last 15 years, Nashville hot chicken has become a hot trend. Even KFC added it to the menu. But for decades before that hot chicken was well known among Nashville's Black community and some white folks. Originally, there was only one place you could get it, the place where it was invented, Prince’s.

Person 1: This is my favorite place to eat. Last week, I was in West Tennessee and I was feening for Prince's chicken. So I had to come Tuesday when they opened up. Now I'm back on Saturday.

Dan Pashman: What does it mean to come here with your son?

Person 1: Building a family culture and a tradition.

Dan Pashman: Today, Prince's is a community institution and a popular spot for tourists and celebrities. 

Dan Pashman: How does Beyoncé like her chicken man?

Person 2: Mild. 

Dan Pashman: Oh, well, she's got hot sauce in her bag though. 

Person 2: Yeah, a Louisiana hot sauce. Yes. 

Dan Pashman: The hot chicken boom has been great for Prince’s but lots of well-funded, white-owned places have also sprung up to capitalize on the trend. And they’ve grown quickly. So as hot chicken becomes big business, are the people who invented it getting what they deserve? 

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Dan Pashman: This is The Sporkful, it's not for foodies, it's for eaters, I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. The hot chicken origin story is apocryphal, but it goes like this. Thornton Prince was a philanderer. One night back in the 30s, after being out all night, he came home to his girlfriend. She was fed up with his womanizing and his partying. So when she made his beloved fried chicken for breakfast, she covered it in the hottest hot sauce she could put together. She wanted him to suffer. But instead he loved it. He asked for more. Soon after, she left him. But Prince couldn't get that chicken out of his head. He worked to recreate the recipe and in 1945 opened a place called Barbecue Chicken Shack. 

Dan Pashman: Over the years, it's had a few different locations. Today there are two: One in South Nashville, and one in a food hall downtown, near the Country Music Hall of Fame. When I went a few years ago, before COVID, I visited a location that’s now closed. It was in a strip mall on the east side of Nashville, near a gas station and a Pizza Hut. From the outside, you'd never guess you were looking at a restaurant that the James Beard Foundation has recognized as an American classic. Inside the wooden booths were decades old. A lot of people refer to them as pews. The hot chicken, itself, is served on a slice of white bread with sliced pickles on top. And everyone knows it's insanely spicy. Even the mild is too spicy for some folks. 

Dan Pashman: When I visited, I sat down with André Prince Jeffries. Thornton Prince was her great uncle. Her parents ran the place before her. Now she's been in charge for forty years. 

Dan Pashman: How much hot chicken do you eat these days?

André Prince Jeffries: Now I eat a piece every day just to test it. But the way I test it mainly is to let it sit overnight because that's how I grew up. It was always a late night place and my father would bring it home on Saturday nights. And when we'd get up on Sunday mornings, ready to go to Sunday school and have our breakfast, I'd see this greasy bag sitting out on the stove. So I like it when it's kind of sat a while and those flavors had kind of saturated it. And that's when I know it's right. So I let my chickens sit awhile and that's when I eat it.

Dan Pashman: What's your strategy with the white bread? Do you eat that before or after? How do you like...

André Prince Jeffries: I don't know. I sop that bread in that grease. 

Dan Pashman: Oh, so the bread is... 

André Prince Jeffries: And some people just come in just for the bread, dip the bread and they buy just the bread soaked. That bread has those good sauces saturated in it. You can't beat it.

Dan Pashman: André didn't spend a lot of time in the restaurant as a kid. Like she said, it was only open later at night. But she does remember one time her dad brought her in there during the day when it was closed. She was ten or eleven. This was during segregation. 

André Prince Jeffries: And he took us to a room outside the kitchen. And I said, what is this room for? And he said, this is for the whit folks. Uh, what? So the Blacks ate in the front and the whites ate in the back. They had a special door. This is the secret of Nashville. They didn't talk about it. They just kind of took it for granted. The Grand Ole Opry people, long time ago — hey, when they come out of that Grand Ole Opry downtown, they beat that door down, getting in that back door in that back room. 

Dan Pashman: Right. 

André Prince Jeffries: In that secret room. 

Dan Pashman: Yeah. 

Dan Pashman: In the years after segregation, the restaurant moved and the layout changed. White customers no longer sat in the back, but the place remained more of a secret in Nashville's white community, while it was well known to the Black community. In 1980, André took over the business. At the time, she was 34, recently divorced, two kids, and working a government job. 

André Prince Jeffries: My mother and father were the ones that were helping me along after my divorce, helping me pay my bills and so forth and so on. And I guess they were thinking of the future because at the time my mother was ill in the hospital and she had been in the hospital with breast cancer. But before she passed, that was her suggestion that I'd take over. 

Dan Pashman: Did you think at that time, did you have plans or aspirations or did you think this was going to be your life's work or... 

André Prince Jeffries: Oh, I had no idea. I had no idea. I'm just just trying to pay a bill, pay a bill. And of course, my eyes were big and never, you know, being in real business-like when I'm still not crossing the T's, not dotting all the I's, but I have learned as I've gone.

Dan Pashman: What are some of the most valuable lessons you've learned running the business over these years?

André Prince Jeffries: Persistence and patience. Don't take criticism personally. Just appreciate it, adjust, and move on. 

Dan Pashman: And you made some pretty what turned out to be a savvy business decisions in your early days? 

André Prince Jeffries: Oh, I don't know. I've had plenty of help. No way I could make anything by myself. 

Dan Pashman: Now, I know before you took over, it was called the Barbecue Chicken Shack.

André Prince Jeffries: Yes. That's another thing that I did, was change the name to Prince. The Prince is the family name. People think I'm calling myself royal, but Prince is our family name.

Dan Pashman: So she never understood why the place was called Barbecue Chicken Shack since they didn't serve barbecue chicken. She changed the name to Prince's Hot Chicken Shack. So she was the first to start calling it hot chicken. And by putting her family's name on the door, she made sure everyone knew who invented it. Those decisions proved to be strokes of branding genius. André also added different spice levels. Before you could only get it one way. And she opened the restaurant during the day instead of just at night. That created a lunch business which brought in families, office workers, and one local politician, who would prove instrumental in spreading the hot chicken gospel.

André Prince Jeffries: I will give due to former Mayor Bill Purcell, who really took the lid off the box. He's been eating it — well, he was eating before I took over. He's the one that started Hot Chicken Festival.

Dan Pashman: Later in the show, we'll talk with Mayor Purcell. That first Nashville Hot Chicken Festival was back in 2007. And that? That was the spark. These days, hot chicken is popping up on menus across the country. Like I said, even KFC is serving it. And André has customers like Anthony Bourdain, Guy Fieri, Kid Rock, Jay-Z, Beyonce, and some others that I found even more surprising. 

André Prince Jeffries: The KKK come in. But all money is green. It doesn't matter. 

[LAUGHING]

Dan Pashman: Do they — were they in their robes?

André Prince Jeffries: Oh, they had the caps on said — had the little signature on the caps, KKK. And they said, they told me they were coming out of Kentucky, where they, you know, they had a meetings. So and then they came back the next day. Hey...

[LAUGHING] 

André Prince Jeffries: You just take the money. Hey, I got bills to pay. I don't care in what you believe. 

Dan Pashman: When those guys first walked in, what were you thinking?

André Prince Jeffries: Am I dreaming? But, hey, you know, no big thing. They got to eat, too. They're hungry.

Dan Pashman: Is it me or is there like a great irony in these Klan members patronizing a Black owned business? 

André Prince Jeffries: Oh, they've always been there. You know, we've always been in the kitchen. So they come where the food is. You know, they don't care. 

Dan Pashman: The complicated racial dynamics of Prince's don't end there. As hot chicken has taken off, a lot of new places have opened up trying to capitalize on the trend. A lot of them are owned by white folks and they have big money behind them. The best known is Hattie B’s. It's a sleek, fast, casual place with four locations in Nashville, all in or near downtown. There are also locations in Birmingham, Memphis, Atlanta… even Vegas. A 2016 profile of their owner on the website Food Republic was titled “Meet the Man Who Launched the Nashville Hot Chicken Craze.” 

Dan Pashman: It said “Hattie B’s has made hot chicken cool.” That sparked a controversy. A response in the newspaper Nashville Scene said, “Let's be honest. When you have a chicken dish that a quarter of the city has loved for almost a century, and the rest of the city comes to love and they learn about it, it's racism that kept most white people from knowing about hot chicken, because white people didn't go into Black neighborhoods. When the Black people who have the decades long experience in making hot chicken don't grow rich off it, but the white kid who got to go to culinary school does, it's not because his hot chicken tastes better. It's that it's still really hard for Black people to go to culinary school or to get the bank loans that would let them expand their businesses into neighborhoods white people will visit.” The piece continues, “No one should begrudge Hattie B’s their success. The food's great, the locations are great. But for them to fail to acknowledge the fundamental reason Hattie B’s is more successful than the older hot chicken joints just feeds into the same old racist dishonesty.”

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Dan Pashman: Coming up, I'll ask André and the customers of Prince's what they think of that. And it turns out it’s not quite so straightforward. Stick around. 

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+++ BREAK +++

 

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Dan Pashman: Welcome back to The Sporkful, I'm Dan Pashman. Last week on the show, I talk with Padma Lakshmi, host and executive producer of Top Chef and the Hulu series Taste The Nation. The world's changed a lot since I first had her on the show five years ago and so has Padma. She’s now more outspoken about a range of issues, including the way women on TV are expected to look.

CLIP (PADMA LAKSHMI): I can't single handedly take down the patriarchy. I wish I could and I'm trying. But I can't. I still have to work within the system if I want a job in television. Today, I have more power not only with Hulu, but even on Top Chef because I'm an executive producer. I have proved my worth and times have changed. And so hopefully everybody's changing with them or they will be left behind. 

Dan Pashman: Padma also talks about the complicated nature of assimilation, and why her show Taste The Nation almost didn’t get made. That one’s up now, check it out.

Dan Pashman: Now back to Prince's Hot Chicken in Nashville. As I sat with André Prince Jeffries, we discussed what I should order. 

André Prince Jeffries: Now I know you're not going to have it hot.

Dan Pashman: Oh, no, no, I'm not going to have it hot. I'm — I like some spice.

André Prince Jeffries: You think you can take a medium? 

Dan Pashman: Well, I'm debating between mild and medium. 

André Prince Jeffries: Well, if you're not used to spicy food, you start with a mild. But if you're used to something spicy, then go to medium. Medium is pretty hot. Now, like I say, I don't go past mild.

Dan Pashman: Maybe I'll get one small bit of mild or one small bit of medium. 

André Prince Jeffries: Okay. 

Dan Pashman: What do you think of that strategy to work? 

André Prince Jeffries: That'll work. 

Dan Pashman: While I waited for the food, I talked with André about Hot Chicken's newfound popularity.

Dan Pashman: Since, you know, there's been this huge explosion called the hot chicken boom over the last 10 years.

André Prince Jeffries: That's right, over the last ten years. 

Dan Pashman: Yeah. How has that affected your business? 

André Prince Jeffries: Well, it's increased. It's helped me. It's helped me. It has caught on so — all of a sudden? Like we've been here all along. So what's the big deal?

Dan Pashman: When you see other restaurants that have come just sort of picked up on hot chicken in the last few years expanding?

André Prince Jeffries: A loft of them do. 

Dan Pashman: They're going into other cities. They're getting — some of them are getting a lot of investment dollars. And even though you guys are doing well, they're also doing really well.

André Prince Jeffries: Well, I — it could have been me, but I was just — I just like taking things slow. I just — my purpose was to try to keep something in the family. Mom and pop places are disappearing so fast. Big business is taking over and big business can always get those big loans. Where as Mom and pop places can't. The banks are not going to give us the money. They don't trust us with the money. So, hey, that's how it works. But something ought to stay just small and keep it local, you know? But I've had offers all over the world to come open up this and open up that. But you got to know what you're doing. If you don't, hey, you've sign your life away. So you can tell I'm not money crazy because otherwise I would been — take it all. All kind of offers I have had, some I regret I hadn't taken. But anyway...

Dan Pashman: Like what? Can you give me a rough idea. Like what was one of the offers that you might regret?

André Prince Jeffries: To come to Dubai was one of them. And of course...

Dan Pashman: Like open a restaurant there?

André Prince Jeffries: Yeah. Yeah. And New York. New York, several times in New York.

Dan Pashman: How much money are they offering you?

André Prince Jeffries: Oh, well, I mean, you know, I probably wouldn't have to work anymore. I wouldn't have to come down here anymore. I could probably be like Colonel Sanders and never be seen. 

[LAUGHING] 

André Prince Jeffries: I enjoy the people. I enjoy the closeness and the intimacy of my customers. And they keep me going. They keep me going.

Dan Pashman: Why did you decide not to take any of those offers?

André Prince Jeffries: My age.

[LAUGHING] 

André Prince Jeffries: My age and some things you just wish would never change.

Dan Pashman: You know, you talked about how the the idea that big business, you know, these — 

André Prince Jeffries: Of course. 

Dan Pashman: They're going to have advantages. 

André Prince Jeffries: Of course. 

Dan Pashman: They're going to be able to get big loans, like you say. 

André Prince Jeffries: Right.

Dan Pashman: There are some people who would say that the other advantage that some of the newer hot chicken chicken places have that allows them to get more funding is that they're owned and run by white people.

André Prince Jeffries: Well, that's true. That's true. You have to admit, racism still exists. Close your eyes if you want to, but it's still there when you open your eyes. There's no secret. That is no secret, because sometimes I wonder, you know, if I were a different color, where would I be?

Dan Pashman: If it happens in the next few years that one of the other places that sprung up more recently, whether it's Hattie B’s or one of the other ones, if five or ten years from now Hattie B’s is worth a hundred million dollars and they get restaurants all over the country, how would you feel about that?

André Prince Jeffries: I mean, that's Hattie B’s. That's Hattie B’s. Like I say, they got the money. You can't be jealous of that. But you know who you are and you stand up on it. 

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Dan Pashman: The chicken came. Right away, you notice the look of it, it has a dark, reddish-brown color to it because of all the hot sauce. And I saw what people were saying about the white bread, how it soaks in all that chicken juice and fat and hot sauce flavor. I ended up asking for extra white bread and extra pickles and then pulling the meat off the bone and putting it on the white bread with some pickles and then folding it up and eating it sort of like a taco. And this was a spice I had not experienced before. The recipe is a secret. It's clearly got a lot of cayenne, but beyond that, who knows? But it's not just hot sauce spicy. It's not just spicy on your tongue. This heat hits you deep. André's daughter, Yay, came back to check on me. 

Dan Pashman: So this part of the interview, I may be coughing and stopping to drink water a little bit. 

Yay Jeffries: I understand.

Dan Pashman: That was amazing. 

Yay Jeffries: Thank you. 

Dan Pashman: And intense but in a very good way. You can see that I completely destroyed the mild.

Yay Jeffries: You annihilated it. 

Dan Pashman: Yeah. 

Yay Jeffries: Definitely. 

Dan Pashman: The medium I struggled with — [coughs] 

Yay Jeffries: I just had the mild, myself. So definitely, that's more than enough for me.

Dan Pashman: So who the hell orders extra extra hot? 

Yay Jeffries: They are usually women get the extra extra hot. 

Dan Pashman: I have to say, I didn't realize quite how amazing this hot chicken was until like hours later. Even as it was burning a hole in my stomach, I found myself craving it like crazy. You know, I've read about how spicy food can cause your brain to release endorphins and dopamine to basically make you feel high. But this is the first time in my life I felt like I had experienced such an intense hot food high that I was suffering withdrawal. I had some leftovers stored in the fridge in my hotel room. Later that night, I was at an event at the hotel and I actually left the event, where they were serving dinner, by the way, to go to my room to eat more hot chicken. Then I went back down to the event.

Dan Pashman: The next day, I went back to Prince's for more and I talked to some customers. At both my visits. The crowd there was about 50-50 Black/white, maybe 60 percent Black at some points. And at least on this particular weekend, most of the Black folks I talked with grew up in Nashville and have been come to Prince's for a long time. The white folks were more recent transplants or tourists. 

Dan Pashman: When did you first hear of Nashville hot chicken?

Person 3: For me, like an hour ago in the car.

Dan Pashman: And for you?

Person 4: It was in the tour book.

Dan Pashman: And so you ended up here at Prince's because it's in the tour book?

Person 4: Yeah, it's a recommended place to go.

Dan Pashman: I talked to one woman there named Carlotta. She's Black, born and raised in Nashville. She comes to Prince's most Friday nights.

Carlotta: And Nashville has a lot of different hot chicken places. But to me, nothing compares to Prince's.

Dan Pashman: Some of the restaurants that have had a lot of money pumped into them and that are doing real well now off of the hatcheck concept — 

Carlotta: Right. 

Dan Pashman: Are also owned by white people. 

Carlotta: OK.

Dan Pashman: You know, and there's been some tension around that issue. You know, what do you make of that? 

Carlotta: Well to be honest, I haven't heard anything about it, but — I'm gonna say it like this. I'm gonna be nice about it. We know how to cook some good chicken. 

[LAUGHING] 

Carlotta: But, you know, of course, the food business, everybody always in competition with the food business because to be honest with you, it's not going anywhere. You know what I'm saying?

Dan Pashman: People got to eat. 

Carlotta: Everybody got to eat. Yeah. So... 

Dan Pashman: Yeah, it's interesting because, you know, it's a big topic right now in the world of food, cultural appropriation...

Carlotta: Right. 

Dan Pashman: And especially when you have food that originates with people of color and then white folks long...

Carlotta: Right 

Dan Pashman: And start making all the money. 

Carlotta: Right. 

Dan Pashman: But I feel like in this case, it's a little more complicated because there's this big hot chicken wing happening but Prince's is benefiting. 

Carlotta: Right, right.

Dan Pashman: They are getting credit. They are getting more money. So it's like it's not like they're just getting steamrolled.

Carlotta: Right. Mm-hmm. 

Dan Pashman: But then you see, you know, like Hattie B’s...

Carlotta: Well, let me tell you, because I do like me some Hattie B's. 

Dan Pashman: Okay. 

Carlotta: I will say that other than this place, Hattie B’s will be the only other place I will go to get some hot chicken. 

Dan Pashman: OK. 

Carlotta: And for me it's not like a Black or white thing. It's not. As long as the food is good and delicious and at an affordable price, they're going to always stay in business. You know?

Dan Pashman: Before I could leave Prince's, there was another pivotal figure in the hot chicken story that I had to meet. Bill Purcell grew up in the Philly area. He came to Nashville to go to law school at Vanderbilt and he never left. In the eighties, he got into state government, which is when he fell in love with hot chicken. After that, he was mayor of Nashville for two terms. In 2007, he helped create the first Nashville Hot Chicken Festival, which, like I said, sparked the boom. But even before that, he and André clearly formed a bond.

André Prince Jeffries: He came and not only just ate the chicken, but he used to come in here and answer the phone. He was so personable. 

Dan Pashman: Right. 

André Prince Jeffries: And take the call in orders and write them down for us. That's his purpose. 

Dan Pashman: Yeah.

André Prince Jeffries: That's his purpose for here. Here on this earth to help André.

[LAUGHING]

Bill Purcell: Yeah, well, that's that's the perfect thing to say. I think we should call the pallbearers in right now.

André Prince Jeffries: You're the best. You're the best.

Dan Pashman: André sat with us as I talked with Mayor Purcell about the first time he ate a chicken. 

Bill Purcell: I think it's very much the same for everyone. You you have some thought that this is different. Obviously, there's another word in the title. It's — it appears to be different because it's darker and spicier and unlike any other fried chicken or chicken you've seen. And really the first bite told me that this was transformative and that I would never be the same.

André Prince Jeffries: He saw the light. 

Bill Purcell: I did. Well, I saw all kind of light. And I — but I knew it was for me. And ultimately, I decided it was for everybody.

Dan Pashman: How — what spice level do you like your chicken at? 

Bill Purcell: Well, it goes without saying this is a hot chicken shack.

André Prince Jeffries: That's right.

Bill Purcell: And so I have hot chicken here. I don't have mild or medium. If you wanted medium, you could look for a medium chicken shack. I don't know of one, but I have what has made this place and this city so special. That's the hot chicken. I don't recommend the extra hot.

Dan Pashman: And what's your strategy, Mr. Mayor? You pick it up and eat it? How do you incorporate the white bread? How do you approach that chicken? 

Bill Purcell: I've sort of worked my way through it. The chicken is on top. I eat the chicken. I consider the bread to be almost like dessert. 

Dan Pashman: Mr. Mayor, were you a spicy food fan before moving to Nashville? 

Bill Purcell: No, I wouldn't say so. It was Prince's that introduced me to this kind of heat. 

Dan Pashman: So you went from not having really any taste for spicy foods eating it hot here? 

Bill Purcell: Yes. Yes.

Dan Pashman: Are your taste buds, OK. Oh, are they functional?

André Prince Jeffries: I think they’re dead.

[LAUGHING] 

Bill Purcell: My taste buds are just fine, thank you. It didn't occur to me to eat anything else. It's a hot chicken shack. You're coming to a place that specializes in hot chicken and you have hot chicken. It would sort of be like asking for — if you want to have a cheesesteak and saying no cheese, or I won't have a cheesesteak and just cheese, no steak. I mean, this is a hot chicken shack. 

Dan Pashman: So are you telling me that if someone doesn't order it hot, they're not really having hot chicken? Are you going to say that right now in front of André?

Bill Purcell: No, I'm going to eat my chicken. 

[LAUGHING] 

André Prince Jeffries: There he goes. He eats it hot.

Dan Pashman: Mr. Mayor, tell me about the first time that you considered this idea of a festival. Tell me about the inspiration for that.

Bill Purcell: Well, the inspiration really came from Nashville. We were in the process of beginning the planning for the celebration of our 200th anniversary as a city. It wasn't really that hard to realize that a celebration that included the whole city had to be around the one indigenous food that came from Nashville, that is Nashville. So that's now 11 years ago. And every year the crowds have grown every year the vendors and the and the hot chicken gets better, too.

Dan Pashman: And Mr. Mayor, since the beginning of that festival and the what I'll call the Nashville hot chicken boom, clearly, and I've learned from talking to André, it's benefited her family and her business a lot. And that's great to see. But I do wonder, like there's also other businesses that have sprung up that kind of jumped onto the trend and that may have benefited from the boom more. And maybe part of that is because André has chosen to keep her business small and local and that's what she wants. But I wonder if it concerns you that the spoils from the boom be distributed equitably.

Bill Purcell: And that's a very interesting question. Obviously, whenever the nation discovers something that it really didn't understand or know about before and what that means, especially for the originator. In this case, the good news is that Prince's is full. It's going to be full again next week. And I think in this case, André and her family and Prince's Hot Chicken Shack have continued to be not just celebrated, but also benefited by the recognition. So in this case, I think you have a great example of where the original has remained not only the best, but the center of it all. 

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Dan Pashman: A couple notes to add. We did reach out to Hattie B’s, but they declined our request for an interview. 

Dan Pashman: Next week, I’ll talk with Stanley Tucci, famous for roles in classic food movies Big Night and Julie and Julia. Also famous for being the hot guy making negronis on Instagram during COVID. He has a new very food centric memoir out, we’ll talk about the famous food scenes in Big Night, and how his battle with oral cancer changed his relationship with food. That’s next week. While you wait for that, listen to last week's show with Padma Lakshmi and please make sure you subscribe to our show in Apple podcast, or favorite us in Spotify or Stitcher. Connect with our show and that way you won't miss episodes. Thanks.