Who needs Tennessee? Nashville hot chicken available at new South MS restaurant
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Rip’n Hot Chicken brings Nashville hot chicken to downtown Biloxi in 2025.
- The menu features tenders, custom sauces, mac bowls, floats and local beer.
- New signage and murals aim to attract visitors near Biloxi’s transit and theater hub.
Mix one of the trendiest foods in the country with the most up-and coming neighborhood in Biloxi, and you get the recipe for Rip’n Hot Chicken restaurant.
The winking chicken logo is the first indication that this new restaurant will be something different.
The goal is to open the Fourth of July weekend, after Adam Ripmaster and Erica Rose turned a nondescript office building at 169 Rue Magnolia into a quirky and fun restaurant. It’s behind the Saenger Theater that is expected to reopen soon after a years-long restoration and across from Coast Transit Authority, where Amtrak trains soon will bring passengers from New Orleans, Mobile and across South Mississippi.
Little do the visitors know when they step off the train or bus, or wander over from the theater or one of the casinos, that a Nashville hot chicken restaurant — and a ‘”filthy animal” sandwich — await in downtown Biloxi.
Ripmaster and Rose know what it takes to make great Nashville hot chicken.
“We moved down here last summer from Nashville,” Ripmaster said. “We were residents there for 20-plus years.” They are self-proclaimed foodies and music lovers and infused those loves into their new restaurant.
“We wanted to bring something that was different and that the market didn’t have,” he said. But they also took inspiration from the Coast when they decided to serve Barq’s root beer in bottles, bring back Barq’s root beer floats and create Barq’s infused barbecue sauce.
Keeping with that sweet and savory Southern flair, “We are going to do beignets as well,” he said. “So we have a hot chicken and beignet platter, and then you can get a basket of beignets if you want.”
Hot or not? Here are the choices
“Nashville hot chicken is taking on a global meaning. It’s not just in Nashville,” Ripmaster said.
Rose and a business partner opened a Nashville hot chicken restaurant in Seattle a few years back and it was hugely successful.
As Nashville became more crowded, and traffic and parking major hassles, the couple decided to join Ripmaster’s family in South Mississippi and open a chicken restaurant, with lots of free city parking outside their door.
Their in-house recipes are a modern day Grandma’s fried chicken, without the bones.
“It’s all gonna be tenders and thighs,” he said, and they will use buttermilk, just like grandma, but with their own blend of seasonings and a crunchy crust.
Customers choose from five levels of heat they want — No spice for kids’ chicken tenders, mild, medium, Nashville hot and the ultimate burnin’ ring of fire.
Top it off
Among a whole array of fixings, as they call them, are Southern-style favorites like macaroni and cheese and banana pudding.
“And then there’s the sandwiches,” Rose said. Most notable is their “Filthy Animal Sandwich” that starts as a hot chicken sandwich, is loaded with cheddar mac and topped with pickles and their signature buttermilk ranch sauce. Other custom sauces are honey mustard, comeback and ancho chipotle.
“So it’s just a big, sloppy, filthy animal,” Ripmaster said.
Their cheddar mac bowl comes with hot chicken chopped up on top. Also on the menu are their own voodoo loaded fries and homemade lemon vinaigrette for their chicken sandwich, all prepared in their open kitchen. Walking Taco is just $5 for a bag of Frito corn chips topped with diced hot chicken, cheddar cheese, green onion and sauce.
As a family restaurant, they decided to add ice cream floats, made with Barq’s root beer, Fanta orange soda or one of the other sodas.
Beer, including local brews from nearby Fly Llama brewery, and seltzers will appeal to adults, especially after some spicy chicken.
Wayfinder to Biloxi hot chicken
Downtown Biloxi around Howard Avenue is thriving, with construction beginning on The Austin container complex and the first residents about to move into the apartments in the Barq building.
To make sure customers can find Rip‘n Hot Chicken in this tucked-away location, the couple commissioned a mural for the north wall of the building, visible from the train and bus station. Another mural will be on the south side of the building, where a patio will have picnic tables for those who want to eat outdoors under sun, shade or in the glow of LED lights.
A big, Rip’n Hot Chicken logo sign with bulb lights all around is designed to attract attention. Working with Biloxi Main Street, the Mary Mahoney walkway that leads from that restaurant to theirs will get an inviting new look.
“We are going to run bulb lights all the way down,” Ripmaster said.
Inside, the restaurant is decorated with memories, like a cabinet radio that actually works, chicken art and a wall of music memorabilia.
“We love our outlaw country,” he said, and they love Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson and other country stars who have a place on the wall of fame, amid the tables and counter seating.
The winkin’ chicken will be seen around town and beyond as customers take home Rip’n Hot souvenirs from the merchandise counter to hold on to the experience of Nashville hot chicken on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
This story was originally published June 26, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
