The Washington Post - 13.03.2020

the washington post

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friday, march 13, 2020

eZ

14

casual Dining

Photos by deb Lindsey For the Washington Post

BY TIM CARMAN

T

o better understand the

heat grading system at

Wooboi Hot Chicken —

and by “understand,” I

mean determining the point at

which I lose all hope for living —

I ordered three sandwiches from

the Herndon storefront and took

them to my car, where I could

cough my lungs out in private.

Chef and owner Minwoo Choi

has classified his six h eat levels —

or “power” levels, as he labels

them — as “classic” (no heat);

levels one, two and three; “code

red” and “code blue” (presum-

ably the color you turn when you

stop breathing). For my first

tasting, I did away with the

bottom two grades and jumped

directly to the mid- and upper

tiers. My order included the

sando with level-two spice, the

Clubhouse with level three and

the “code red” Thousand sunny,

which is Wooboi’s take on a KFC

Double Down, with two fried-

chicken cutlets serving as the

bread. (obviously, you can cus-

tomize each sandwich to your

own heat tolerance.)

To me, the level-two sando is

everything you could possibly

want from a hot chicken sand-

wich, save perhaps for the insane

amount of scoville units neces-

sary to prove your alpha-male

indifference to pain — and your

complete disregard for flavor. My

sando was sprinkled with a 12-

plus-ingredient spice blend built

around jalapeño peppers, and its

heat was ample, stinging the

tongue without e xterminating its

taste buds. The cider coleslaw

see casual on 15

Wooboi, that’s a hot chicken sandwich

To best experience the Herndon shop, avoid

the superhot spice blends

If you go

Wooboi hot chicken

139 spring st., suite 1, herndon,

Va., 703-435-3 70 3;

wooboichicken.com.

hours: 1 1 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday

through Fr iday; 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

saturday.

nearest Metro: n/a

Prices: $2.99 to $12.99 for all

items on the menu.

aBOVE: The sando with level-

two heat and a side of fried okra

at Wooboi Hot chicken in

Herndon. lEFT: carlos

Marquiz seasons the fried

chicken. Diners may never

grasp the precision behind

every spice blend.

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