Bottom Line: The Ghost Pepper Chicken Fries from Burger King bring a nice kick of heat to a fast food favorite from that chain.
Chicken is on the menu again! I just reviewed the Honey Pepper Pimento Chicken Sandwich from Chick-fil-A (which is pretty darn good, more on that here) and I realized I had not gotten to Burger King’s latest spicy addition which is about to head back to Limited-Time-Only-Ville. The King has come up with a Ghost Pepper version of his Chicken Fries and those are haunting the chain this Halloween season. I picked up an order of those while they are still available and they should definitely tempt lovers of spicy (fast) food.
Here is the description from the website: “White meat chicken fries, taken up a notch with ghost pepper spice added to the breading for ultimate flavor & heat!” They come in an eight or twelve piece order and you can make that a combo with fries and a drink if you like.
As far as the Chicken Fries part of this, they are basically the same as the other versions on the menu apart from the spices. If you like those (and can take some heat), you will certainly like these (you can read my review of their previous kicked-up Chicken Fries here). The breading does not have too much crunch, but it still has some decent texture. The ground chicken is spongy but tasty and seasoned up well, and the Ghost Pepper spice definitely kicks things up. The fries come with barbeque sauce for dipping and that works well as the sweet and smoke from the sauce blend nicely with the spicy seasonings. But if you don’t want the sauce, these also work just fine on their own.
As for the heat, you feel that right away and it is immediately over the Medium level on my scale. As you keep eating, these bring even more burn and work their way up to the Hot level. This is definitely spicy for the drive thru and one of the hotter items BK has offered (hotter than the previous Chicken Fries), and I would love it if they kept these on the permanent menu. The average mortal should probably avoid these, but us chiliheads would eat them by the basketful if they sold them that way.
Calorie-wise, these are only 280 cals for an order of eight. That is less than a small order of French Fries (300 cals) and the same as a small order of onion rings. In fact, the Chicken Fries really count as a side and that is the way I ordered them. I got the Double Cheeseburger (an unsung BK classic) for free through the app with my rewards, and that paired nicely with the Ghost Pepper Chicken Fries for a pretty cheap lunch! And at only 400 cals for the burger, I wasn’t really breaking the calorie bank.
As mentioned, the Ghost Pepper Chicken Fries are only here for the feared limited time, and they will likely disappear shortly after Halloween. They run $3.99 in my area for an order of eight and $4.99 for twelve which is not bad for the drive thru these days. The King also brought back the Ghost Pepper Whopper (you can read my review from last year here), so feel free to order them together. The good news is that spicy food increases your metabolism so you can use that to justify the extra calories from the Whopper, right? But if you are going to get these, do it soon because you will have a ghost of a chance of finding them once the spooky season is over.
Now, can I please have something without so much chicken in it? Surely all those “head chefs” getting a high paycheck from these chains can come up with something else to spice up? If not, I have plenty of suggestions.
Nutrition Info:
Serving Size: 8 Chicken Fries
Calories: 280
Fat: 17g (3.5g Sat/0g Trans)
Protein: 12g
Carbs: 18g
Sodium: 770mg