We Try Trailer Birds Nashville Hot Chicken at Dickey’s

Barbecue chain Dickey’s has become the latest to board the Nashville hot chicken train.

Trailer Birds, the newest addition to the expanding Dickey’s virtual brand portfolio (the fourth since 2021), offers Nashville-style hot chicken sandwiches and tenders.

So, how does Trailer Birds stack up versus local hot chicken heavyweights like Ricky’s, Palmer’s, Dave’s or 2 Neighbors?

Not a fair fight in any of those cases, so we’ll skip the comparisons.

Instead, more suitable opponents in Trailer Birds’ weight class would be fast-food chicken chains peddling hot chicken sandwiches on the side, like Church’s, Chick-fil-A and KFC.

You won’t find Trailer Birds’ menu on the Dickey’s website. Instead, you’ll find it on Trailer Birds or third-party delivery apps. But if you’re picking up, you can do so at select Dickey’s locations.

A Trailer Birds’ Nashville chicken sandwich is a couple of tenders between a toasted bun, topped with coleslaw and a few pickle slices. Four spice levels range from virgin (no heat) to fubar (max heat).

Knowing that we’d be later testing the flames of the fubar tenders, we went conservative on the chicken sandwich and opted for the more forgiving second-level heat. The spice on this level is hardly overwhelming but still noticeable. For those with a low to moderate heat sweet spot, this is probably your best bet.

The sandwich is a respectable, if unspectacular, creation. It’s good-sized, the bun was sufficient and the tenders were fresh from the fryer. The coleslaw was decent, and there was just enough to compliment the sandwich. And the best part about this sandwich? It’s a mere $3.99. That’s a big value these days.

Next were the fubar tenders ($7.99 for a three-piece combo), the spiciest Trailer Birds has to offer. While not quite burn your face off scorching, and certainly not on par (or anywhere close) with, say, the nuclear “A-Bomb” level of Ricky’s Nashville Hot Chicken, these tenders pack legitimate heat and are no joke.

Our main complaint was that they were on the greasy side, though that didn’t prevent us from finishing all three tenders. Dipped into Trailer Birds’ comeback sauce, they didn’t lack flavor.

For research purposes, we tried the virgin, zero-heat tenders. Without the spice, these were reduced to run-of-the-mill chicken tenders, comparable to those in the grocery store freezer aisle. The jalapeno cheese sauce on the side tasted like Ricos nacho cheese, just with jalapenos.

The sides offered at Trailer Birds are crispy tots, hand-cut fries, mac and cheese, coleslaw and Texas toast. You can get the fries or tots with Cajun or hot seasoning (we went with Cajun-seasoned tots). Everything in our order came out fresh, so points for that.

Trailer Birds exists somewhere on the same tier as KFC and Church’s and below Chick-fil-A and Popeyes in the spicy chicken sandwich hierarchy. Trailer Birds won’t make any “best of” lists, but if you need a hot chicken sandwich fix in a pinch, it should do the trick.