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How to host your own “Hot Ones” party: Tips from fire-breathing experts

The first time Sarah and Joseph Stanoch hosted a “Hot Ones”-inspired party in 2017, they debunked the theory that milk is the best way to extinguish a spicy mouth.

After watching one of their friends chug a gallon over the sink and then proceed to puke, the couple was grateful they stuck to beer.

“I used to work at Anheuser Busch, so we actually had the party in my office on a Saturday, and it was just four of us, but they had a bar in the office with unlimited beer, and I feel like light beer really helps with the heat,” Sarah said. “Milk is clearly not the way to go, and water just exacerbates it because it swirls the heat around your mouth.”

“Hot Ones” is a popular YouTube series that host Sean Evans started in 2015. He interviews celebrities while they eat their way through chicken wings with 10 increasingly hotter sauces. Evans uses hot sauce as a way to disarm his guests, asking them more personal questions as the spice level heats up. And Colorado’s had a few features in the lineup over the years, including Boulder-based Seed Ranch Flavor Co.’s Hot Thai Green sauce in season 11, Fort Collins-based Burns & McCoy Exhorresco sauce in season 7 and Mezcaline Oaxacan sauce in season 18, as well as Denver-based Sauce Leopard’s The Seventh Reaper sauce.

During that time, hot sauce culture has become its own beast. Evans’ painful interviews have inspired masochists like the Stanochs, to convince their own friends to gather around a table and cry, sweat, vomit and suffer together. Baere Brewing Co. in Denver even hosted its own hot wing challenge on June 22, using the “Hot Ones” sauce kit.

“My husband and I are big heat thrill seekers, but it’s just a fun summer activity to get to know your friends more that’s pretty low budget,” Sarah said. “And hey, you get to reuse the sauces after.”

For the Stanochs’ second “Hot Ones” party in February 2022, Sarah decided to challenge herself and go without any liquid relief. She was inspired by the singer Lorde’s impressive interview. “I was so proud of myself but then of course, the next day, my esophagus was just on fire,” she said.

“Hot Ones” premiered its 24th season at the end of May, and after watching it the other day, Sarah has a new idea in her back pocket. “If I do it a third time, I think I’ll try using ice cream to help with heat after watching Will Smith on the new season,” she said.

But it’ll be a while before the next party, since “I’m pregnant right now, and that’s probably not good for the baby,” she laughed.

For your own “Hot Ones” party, here are some tips from the fire-breathing experts:

How to convince your friends

Not everyone has to be a hot sauce connoisseur to join in on the searing fun. The Stanochs bribed eight of their friends with a pony keg of Oskar Blues pilsner, and even made seitan wings for the vegetarian attendees. Four of the six guests completed all 10 of the wings, and two folded at sauce No. 8. “We made bets beforehand, trying to guess who was most likely to rub their eyes,  who would drink the most beer, who was most likely to finish or vomit,” Sarah said.

Lexi Omholt and her fiancé, Jack Verschleiser, on the other hand, just moved to Denver a month ago, and used the “Hot Ones” challenge as a way to get to know their new next door neighbors. The couple are longtime fans of the YouTube series and just the other week bought the official “Hot Ones” kit (a full 10-pack is $120) with the lineup of sauces featured in season 23.

Their next-door neighbors in Denver’s Highland neighborhood, Courtney Peter and Hayden Davis, were over for an introductory dinner when they spotted the kit. The group decided to spice up their second double date and attempt “the gauntlet,” Omholt said.

“It wasn’t your typical formal dinner party with the four of us practically dying in their kitchen,” Omholt said. “We spent two hours together, crying, bonding, and getting closer.”

The couple now plans to reuse the kit, and this time they’ll get to know the whole neighborhood at the upcoming block party. “I don’t know if I’ll be passing around Da Bomb, though,” Omholt said.

Give fair warning for Da Bomb

The main reason to secure an official “Hot Ones” sauce kit is to ensure a taste of Da Bomb, which is the only sauce that has consistently remained in every season’s lineup because of its ferocity. Da Bomb, which hails from Kansas City, is made with habanero peppers and chipotle puree. Actor Jason Sudeikis, a Kansas City native, called it a “disgusting sauce that hurts your mouth,” last season.

“Hot Ones” uses the Scoville scale to measure the spice level, and Da Bomb measures 135,600 Scoville Heat Units. Da Bomb is strategically placed at No. 8 in the lineup to make the final two sauces manageable.

Meghan Keelean and Austin Thornburg hosted eight of their friends at Thornburg’s apartment in Washington Park last year. “It was a mix of people that I know are die-hard fans of hot sauce and spicy food, and people that just like to go to parties,” Thornburg said.

“Consent was king. No one had to eat the wings if they didn’t want to,” he added.

Out of the eight attendees, two folded ahead of Da Bomb “because they knew what was coming next,” Thornburg said.

Thornburg has always sought out spice, ordering El Jefe wings from Fire On The Mountain by choice and eating raw hot peppers straight from the garden. But even Da Bomb gave him pause. “As somebody that has an entire side of his refrigerator dedicated to hot sauces, it’s not great,” Thornburg said. “It’s extremely hot but doesn’t taste very good. I’ve tasted the full line of three or four seasons worth of the show and Da Bomb is always markedly hotter in the lineup.”

Keelean, who is more reluctant when it comes to spicy food, made it all the way through the lineup, even Da Bomb, but not without heading to the sink to pour milk over her tongue. “You just have to ride it out,” she said. “At one point, I just went outside and breathed in the cool air.”

Make your own wings

Thornburg has hosted two “Hot Ones” parties and cooked his own wings both times. Both were during cold weather so people could find some relief outside. Most recently, he grilled 100 wings, seasoned them with salt and pepper and sauced them as they went. “It’s best to pre-cook the wings and let them cool down, so they don’t break the sauces when you toss them,” he said. “And only toss as many wings as will be eaten. You don’t need extra Da Bomb pieces.”

Thornburg offered to-go boxes for the leftover wings, and let each of his guests take home their favorite sauce from the “Hot Ones” kit.

Offer a variety of quick relief methods

While milk is the obvious choice – and the one most often featured on the show – it’s not the only one. Gordon Ramsay famously brought Pepto Bismol, donuts, lime and lemon juice and a whole bag of tricks to his interview.

“It honestly wouldn’t have occurred to me to have any sort of relief if I didn’t watch the show,” Thornburg said. For his “Hot Ones” party, he made horchata and virgin pina colada mix for the table. There were also some cheese and crackers, plus a gallon of milk, which they ran out of towards the end. Instead of drinking it, Keelean preferred swishing it around in her mouth.

“The prize was an ice cream cake,” Thornburg said.

Others, like the Stanochs, made sure to have wet wipes to avoid any hot-sauce-in-the-eye incidents.

Get the scoop on your friends, like host Sean Evans

Nils Thorson invited three friends to attempt the “Hot Ones” challenge” during the pandemic to pass the time. “Maybe if I had asked them to do the same thing today, their answers would be a little bit different,” Nils said. “But it’s not like you’re going to consume Da Bomb once a week after this, so we were able to check that off the box.”

His wife, Olivia, who has a degree in broadcast journalism, decided to act as host Sean Evans and ask the group surprising questions while they suffered their way through each wing. They filmed it and posted it on YouTube, so they could show other friends and family stuck inside.

“When we host something, we don’t half-ass it,” Nils said. “We hosted a Harry Potter party a couple of years ago and sorted people by house. …If we’re going to do something, we go all out anyway, so if I’m going to ask my friends to come over, and I know there’s a guarantee of pain, then I want to bring as much fun, intrigue and excitement to the experience as I can. “

The official “Hot Ones” kits don’t come with question prompts, but they should. Olivia called each of the participants’ wives to get some out-of-left-field prompts for her questions, like a story about how one husband rang up a huge bill calling the Miss Cleo Psychic Hotline one summer when he was younger and had to paint houses to pay for it.

While trying to just catch a breath after Da Bomb, she asked them what their favorite things about their wives were.

“Truly taking on the format of the show allowed us to get to know each other more vulnerably and deeply,” Olivia said. “We got to develop the friendship in a new way by asking surprising questions and also watching how people react.”