People who love spicy food really love it. They tend to be more loyal to restaurants offering items that they crave.
But just because they really love spicy food doesn’t mean they love really spicy food. The heat they’re seeking usually isn’t the kind that inflicts genuine pain, but rather something that stimulates their tastebuds and encourages them to go for another bite.
“Good spice opens up flavor profiles you didn’t even realize were there. It can make sweetness feel sweeter, acidity sharper, and richness more balanced,” Kayla Pfeiffer, chef and owner of Bicyclette Cookshop and Heyday Cookshop, both in Naples, Fla., said via email.
Heyday opened at the end of April, and one of its signature items is silken tofu with house-made chili crisp, which Pfeiffer, a champion of the Food Network series Chopped, makes by warming dried chiles in hot oil with ginger and Sichuan peppercorns and then adding mushroom powder and ground toasted peanuts.
She decided to make her own condiment to give it more complexity than many of the commercially available ones, which she said tend to be “either pure heat or pure crunch.”
She said the mushroom powder adds depth, the ginger adds brightness, and the Sichuan peppercorns provide “a slightly numbing effect that keeps you going back for another bite instead of just burning your palate out. It’s spicy, but it’s also meant to be delicious and addictive.”
She said she intentionally keeps the spice level approachable.
“The goal isn’t to punish people. The Sichuan peppercorns create more of a lingering sensation than a sharp, immediate burn,” she said.
But sometimes the goal kind of is to punish people. There’s a subset of customers, mostly males aged 18 to 34, who like the challenge of eating spicy food until they hallucinate, and those are the customers who order the Reaper sauce at Dave’s Hot Chicken.
“We’ve actually made our Reaper hotter since last year,” said Dave’s vice president of marketing, Srishti Handa. “It’s really, like, blow-your-head off hot.”
“There’s something about wanting to take down the un-take-downable, in a way,” she said. “That creates a lot of fun content and a really wonderful community that people are excited to share — almost a flywheel of different community and engagement.”
That said, only about 1% of Dave’s customers order either extra hot or Reaper.
Among the other five sauces — not hot, light mild, mild, medium, and hot — mild and medium are the most popular.
But Handa said she sees the appeal of extra spicy food. “You just want to eat more and more … it’s just a thrill,” she said. “There’s a little bit of pleasure and pain interplay in a way.”
Indeed, there’s a scientific theory behind that. The heat of chiles doesn’t rely on your sense of taste, but rather your sense of touch: It’s a mild chemical burn that causes pain. According to the theory, your brain responds by releasing endorphins, inducing mild euphoria.
Over time, frequent spicy-food eaters can become desensitized to chile-induced pain, while still enjoying the endorphin rush. So when people say spicy food is addictive, they might be right.
And spicy items are proliferating on menus, according to Technomic’s Ignite Menu data, with 79.9% of operators offering spicy items, compared to 78.4% five years ago. Chili crisp is the fastest growing ingredient, up 20.2%, followed by chile powder (+13.8%) and hot honey and chipotle Buffalo sauce (both up 13.3%).
Buffalo sauce is the vehicle that Long John Silver’s went with for its first foray into spicy items, offering Frank’s RedHot Buffalo sauce as an option on any entrée, including battered or grilled shrimp, chicken, or fried cheese bites.
“We know guests are looking for bigger, bolder flavors right now, and Buffalo is one of those flavors people already love,” director of brand marketing Meredith Smith said in an email, adding that, although the sauce is associated with chicken, “it pairs really naturally with seafood, too.”
The items were rolled out in May and are available through June 21.
Smith said the chain’s research showed Buffalo sauce resonating especially well with millennials and men, although it “has become a pretty mainstream flavor with broad appeal overall.”
Blaze Pizza has long had a spicy pizza sauce — a traditional red sauce with jalapeño pepper added — that the chain is actually toning down a bit.
“We hear from the majority that it’s a little too spicy,” chief operating officer Casey Terrell said. “We’re trying to make it a little more mainstream.”
He dug into Blaze’s data and found that, although the chain skews toward millennial moms and older members of Gen Z, spicy items overindex toward men, and a little bit toward men aged over 35.
He added that about half of all spicy orders come from first-time guests, and they end up being better-than-average customers.
“They tend to come back a little bit more. … They reorder a little more often and the average check tends to be a little bit higher. It’s one of those things where we say, ‘Hey, that’s interesting.’”
Tina Tedla, chef and owner of Enat Ethiopian, with two locations in Charlotte, N.C., agrees that spice lovers tend to be particularly loyal.
“Customers who enjoy our spicy dishes tend to become very loyal because they develop strong cravings for those flavors and appreciate the authenticity behind them,” she said in an email.
They particularly love the slow-simmered doro wat chicken stew and awaze tibs, or spiced beef cubes.
Those are centered around berbere, a spice blend that combines cayenne pepper with garlic, ginger, paprika, cardamom, cloves, fenugreek, and other warming spices.
“The heat is layered and flavorful rather than just overpowering,” she said.
“Spicy food also creates a memorable dining experience, and that often leads to repeat visits, word-of-mouth recommendations, and long-term customer relationships,” she said, adding that she has seen a noticeable increase in customers seeking spicy flavors.
“Social media, food culture, and global cuisine trends have made people more adventurous with their palates. Customers are not only more willing to try spicy dishes, but many are specifically asking for higher spice levels and more authentic heat.”
At Wingstop, navigating heat levels is part of the experience. The chain rates its flavors on a 1-to-5 flame scale, helping customers find their comfort zone — from no heat all the way up to Atomic.
"Atomic is definitely for the true heat seekers, with Mango Habanero and Cajun right behind it," head of culinary Larry Bellah said in an email.
On the milder end, Hot Honey Rub has become a breakout success. Originally a limited-time offer, customer demand was strong enough to earn it a permanent menu spot.
Brian Paquette, director of culinary at Chili’s, said spicy sauces appeal to customers who are seeking out new experiences, and there are lots of them.
“We’ve definitely seen growing demand for spicy offerings over the last several years,” he said in an email. “People are constantly seeing new flavor trends online, whether it’s Nashville Hot, hot honey, chili crisp, or globally-inspired sauces, and they want to experience those flavors when they dine out. At the same time, spicy foods create a really satisfying sensory experience that keeps people coming back.”
And operationally, sauces are easy to use on different dishes.
“These sauces give us the flexibility to put a new spin on classic menu items — from our Fried Mozzarella to our new Big Crispy chicken sandwiches — for those guests looking for a little extra kick.”
Additionally, sauce options like these dovetail with how younger customers like to eat.
“There’s a lot more dipping, sauce customization, and mix-and-match behavior, which spicy sauces naturally fit into,” he said.
Bellah said Wingstop’s customers also like to mix and match, sometimes using the chain’s house-made ranch dressing to counterbalance the heat.
“One of my personal favorite combos is Atomic mixed with ranch — you get that perfect balance of heat and cool in every bite,” he said.
Contact Bret Thorn at bret.thorn@informa.com
Follow him on TikTok and Instagram: @foodwriterdiary
Members help make our journalism possible. Become a Restaurant Business member today and unlock exclusive benefits, including unlimited access to all of our content. Sign up here.