Mac and cheese get the Flamin’ Hot treatment

In the snack food pantheon, few can claim the cult following of the one, true king of spicy goodness: Flamin’ Hot Cheetos.

Those delectable and hurtsso-good munchies have found an unlikely home at a new San Antonio food operation. The ghost kitchen outfit dubbed HotBox by Wiz, as in Wiz Khalifa, the Grammy-nominated artist whose roots are decidedly more Pittsburgh than San Antonio, uses Flamin’ Hot Cheetos as a crispy crust on Hot Cheetos Buffalo Mac Bites.

These are an amalgamation of chopped Buffalo-style chicken tenders and gooey mac and cheese that get crusted with Flamin’ Hot Cheetos and then deep-fried. It’s a fiery and indulgent munchie that would be right at home on any Alamo City bar menu.

HotBox by Wiz is a deliveryonly business, and what you’ll see when you open the package is four roughly square-shaped blobs sporting the familiar neon-red skin of crushed Flamin’ Hots. Tear one open, and you find a creamy heart of mac and cheese made with pasta that still has a bit of al dente bite.

It’s a perfect textural sensation

that’s at once Grandma’s oven-baked mac with a breadcrumb crust and a defiant reproach

to tradition that just feels right.

While those blazing bites

alone are a reason to place an order, HotBox’s menu has a few other Texas-friendly surprises up its sleeve.

Its take on chili may be heresy to orthodox purists with not one but three types of beans, but it’s a dang fine bowl of red with plenty of cumin and cilantro punch under a gooey cap of shredded cheese. Blazed Ends, HotBox’s take on burnt ends, go bold with far more tonguetingling spice in its sticky-sweet sauce than we’re used to encountering at local barbecue joints — a twist I happily embrace. I’d gladly order either again when the munchies strike.

Speaking of munchies, Khalifa’s public persona is intimately tied to his enthusiastic use of marijuana, and the menu for his restaurant chain is laced with weedy references such as the Blazed Ends and Mile High Dark Chocolate Brownies. But the HotBox by Wiz website makes a point to let customers know all the food is weed-free and “perfect for everyone, not just the stoners.”

HotBox by Wiz is a deliveryonly food business. To place an order, search for “HotBox by

Wiz” on the Uber Eats or Doordash apps. More at hotboxbywiz. com.

Paul Stephen / Staff Hot Cheetos Buffalo Mac Bites from the delivery-only HotBox by Wiz is among the ghost kitchen’s spicy offerings.