BLOG 11: Buffalo Wings

America might not exactly have their own cuisine like other cultures do, but it was an American that invented the perfect food to enjoy with your Super Bowl and your beer: the Buffalo Chicken Wing. The genius (though probably not exactly intentional) idea came from the mind of Teressa Bellisimo. She and her husband Frank owned a restaurant called the Anchor Bar in Buffalo, New York. It was on one fateful day in 1964 that she took the chicken wings, mixed it with her special sauce and served it with celery and blue cheese—the only ingredients she had available at the moment. Little did she know, the lack of condiments made her earn culinary respect. Ever since then it has been enjoyed in every bar in the country. A Buffalo Wing Festival is even held every year in Buffalo.

In San Jose, one of the popular places that people go to for the dish is Smoke Eaters. One of the things that Smoke Eaters is famous for is their Hellfire Challenge, which is to eat 12 wings dipped in their hellfire sauce in 10 minutes. No napkins, no drinks, and they must lick the sauce off their fingers once their done. But it doesn’t stop there, they must wait 5 minutes and feel the “afterburn” to fully win the challenge. A friend of mine took on the challenge a while back and fortunately lived to tell me the story. Needless to say, he made it through 6 pieces and went through what he described as “the worse pain of his life.”
Even the famous Adam Richman of Man vs. Food thought that the challenge was truly extreme. He succeeded nonetheless.

This is my friend keeling over in pain after the Hellfire Challenge.

Source: http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1920434,00.html

Watch Man vs Food's Adam Richman survive the fire: