Recently made famous by KFC Nashville Hot Chicken, Nashville Hot Sauce is the sauce used on the regional dish that has been around way longer than KFC has been selling it. The hot sauce is more of a paste than a sauce, thick and grainy, it is full of flavor.
Nashville Hot Sauce is a regional hot sauce made from cayenne pepper, other spices and brown sugar. Served on fried chicken to make Nashville Hot Chicken.
Hot sauces vary from restaurant to restaurant with some using a small amount of their sauce in the chicken brine or breading and others dredging it when it is cooked or on the side for dipping. One thing is always the same, it is HOT!
Have you ever been to Nashville? Hubby and I love it! We stay down on lower Broadway and hop from bar to bar listening to the stellar live music all day long.
Add a few good ole southern iced teas, moonshine, BBQ and Nashville Hot Chicken and you have yourself a nice little weekend. In fact, it has been nearly a year since we have been which means we are due for a trip!
Nashville Hot Sauce can be made with a vegetable oil or butter base. Although a vegetable oil base won’t harden as easy, I personally like a butter base. You can use a smidge of honey to stabilize the sauce.
It just requires the sauce to be warmed up slightly before using, because butter solidifies when chilled. Use clarified butter, butter without fat solids, works best.
You can also vary the amount of cayenne pepper used to adjust the heat. We like it hot, so I use a lot!
Traditional Nashville Hot Chicken is served on white bread with pickles. However, I wanted something a little more hearty and sweet to compliment my Nashville Hot Sauce, so I opted for buttermilk biscuits. Who doesn’t love biscuits?
Also served with vinegary pickles, I used my honey habanero pickles. Serve over my Buttermilk Fried Chicken, Popcorn Chicken or Nashville Hot Sauce Sliders.
Do you like spicy foods? Here are a few more you’ll enjoy!
- 1/2 cup unsalted clarified butter
- 3 tablespoons cayenne pepper more or less to taste
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 2 teaspoons kosher salt
- 2 teaspoons black pepper
- 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 2 teaspoons garlic powder
- 1 tablespoon honey , optional
- Combine clarified butter with the rest of ingredients in a small saucepan. Stir over low heat until combined.
Make sure to come back and let us know how you liked this recipe. We love comments and ratings!
Being from Nashville Honey alone is fine with no extra sweet added such as sugar 😍
Tried your NASHVILLE hot,
Pretty good hot sauce tastes
Like KfC’s.
Ifyou want real nashville
Hot chIcken next time in naShville, theres only one place to go.
the original nhc.
Princes hot chicken.
Boltons original recipe.
Ewing Ave. off dickerson rd.
I grew up on princess
Hi! Your hOt sauce looks great!
Please note that “music Row” is a business district Nearly tWo miles from the tourist area where you and your hubby bar hop in nashville, which is called lower broadway. <3
Thank you,
Nashville, Tn
Thanks for the input!
Now you’re a nashville pro! 🙂
Flavor is good but My sauce turned out LUMPY that affected the texture of the Food. Quite different compared to the Nashville kfc chicken. Your pic shows a much smoother consistency.
Hi Will, thanks for stopping back through! I’ve never had KFCs version of Nashville Hot Sauce, so I’m not quite sure what the consistency is like. Nashville Hot Sauce in Nashville is in fact, a thick, lumpy type of sauce. Not thin, very thick. You can almost feel the grains of the spices. I’ll have to stop by a KFC to try theirs and compare.
This looks wonderful!
I am such a huge fan of nashville hot sauce so this is right up my alley! THanks for an awesome recipe so I can replicate a favorite at home. yummy.
So good thank you. I added a tablespoon of honey as well to get more of a glaze and it helped with stabalizing the spicesin the butter. I served home fried chicken smothered in nashville hot sauce on ciabatta rolls.
Reminds me of a American version of hot chilli oil for Chinese dumplings. My new favorite way to eat chicken. Might try it on dumplings too
Hi Jeff! Honey is a great addition and thank YOU so much for taking time to come back and let us know.
I love chili oil for dumplings too, that is a great idea. Now I’m hungry for chicken and dumplings (Get it? My attempt at a joke 🙂 )
While it tastes exactly like what I’ve before in Nashville (loved Hattie B’s) it never really combined. It was a glob of spices sitting below flavored butter. I’ll have to see how well it combines with a chicken recipe.
It is certainly thick and needs to be stirred RIGHT before using. It will settle when it sits.
Also be mindful of the type of butter you use, a good clarified European butter works best.
And if you want a more traditional, you can substitute oil for butter, it will give the more traditional texture.
Hope you enjoy!
I love your recipes. When I press the print button underneath the photo it doesn’t show a printer friendly version of your recipe. Can you help me out?
Hi Julian,
Sure! I am about to email you. It might be because you have popups blocked, it might block the popup to approve the print format.
Jessica
Can this be canned via the water bath method and stored?
It sure can!
Nashville Hot Sauce is one of my all-time favorites, I never thought about making it at home before but I love this recipe!
I HAVE to try this recipe. I love any sauce with butter and a little kick!
I can’t speak to whether or not this tastes like authentic Nashville hot sauce, but I wanted to try it, and to me, the butter flavor was overwhelming. I couldn’t eat the chicken, because it literally tasted like it was covered in melted butter with cayenne pepper. The mixture separates into melted butter at the top and a glob of spices on the bottom. Maybe that’s what Nashville hot sauce is, but I’ll just use Tabasco sauce next time.
Hi Chris, Nashville Hot Sauce is pretty globby and thick by nature. It is either made with butter or vegetable oil and the type of butter you use can make a world of difference. You do need to stir it well before using and generally not use as much or as a dipping sauce like you would with Frank’s or another hot sauce. It isn’t for everyone. Thank you for the feedback!