This Alexandrian Cook Thinks Cairenes Aren't Spicy Enough

The only table in Hot Wheelz has a waiver on it. You sign before you sit. No one has dared sit there yet.

Hot Wheelz is a street food spot in Nasr City built around five things: kebda, sujuk, hawawshi, chicken fajita, and a founder who arrived in Cairo 12 years ago and never quite got over how the city eats. "When I first came to Cairo I found out, no offense, that Cairenes don't know how to eat," Ethar Ihab, founder of Hot Wheels, tells SceneEats. "A lot of hype is built on things that are average at best."Ethar Ihab wasn't born in Alexandria - she grew up between Kuwait and Port Said - but she'll tell you she's Alexandrian in the way that counts: through food. In her household, spicy sauce is on the table as its own course. When she got to Cairo, what she found around her was a different story.

"The impression I got was most people's parents don't really cook and most of their food is takeout," Ihab says. "Which surprised me because I came from a family that loves cooking."

Her father had a kebda recipe the whole family put in requests for by name, and she went to him with a deal.

"Baba's kebda recipe is in very high demand. It doesn't taste like your usual kebda," Ihab says. "So, I told him to just give me his secret recipe and I'll handle everything else."He agreed. That handover is where Hot Wheelz begins. The menu has four items, all things she grew up eating at home, none of them adjusted for an audience that might want it milder. She always assumed the kebda would lead. The chicken fajita had other plans; it's what people keep coming back for, which Ihab will admit still catches her off guard.

What stays fixed is the thinking behind the heat. "We make sure the spice doesn't overtake the flavour. You can have spicy food but there is still flavour, it's not just spicy for the sake of it."

The spice levels run from Level 0 to Final Boss. Anyone who has told Ihab they're good with spice and then eaten at her family table has had to reconsider.To design the space, Ihab went back to the same place she went for the food: her own childhood. The branding runs on 8-bit nostalgia, with a monkey mascot, spice levels named like game stages, and menu items named after the games themselves; Kebda Zuma, Super Sujuk, Hawawshi Crash, and Flappy Fajita.

Which brings you back to that table. The Final Boss level. You're not even allowed to sit there and attempt the restaurant's spiciest items if you haven't signed a waiver first. If you finish the plate without water, without anything to cut the heat, it's on the house. So far, everyone has had to pay.
"I don't mind anyone challenging me and seeing who wins," Ihab says.

Now that you know where Hot Wheelz came from, the only question is whether you'd pull up a chair and be able to get a free meal.