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While there are many amazing videos that go up on TikTok, the social network can also be a breeding ground for bad ideas. They've challenged users to slap a teacher, make themselves black out, lick public toilet seats and of course, eat Tide pods. Now, there is a recipe making the rounds and doctors are warning that it is very dangerous.
The meal being cooked up is called "NyQuil chicken" but is also known as "sleepytime chicken," and to prepare it, chicken is braised in the nighttime cold medicine.
In a video going viral, one TikToker removes some thinly sliced chicken breasts from a package, puts them in a pot, douses them with a full bottle of NyQuil and cooks them up. A second video shows the meat being stirred in the blue concoction and then displayed with some tongs.
The trend hopped over to YouTube where another video claims the recipe is a cold remedy.
As new videos pop up showing the dish being made, or other similar ones being concocted, like Nyquil pasta, experts are urging people not to make or eat foods cooked in NyQuil, warning them that they are not at all a cold remedy.
One doctor told Mic.com, "When you cook cough medicine like NyQuil, you boil off the water and alcohol in it, leaving the chicken saturated with a super concentrated amount of drugs in the meat. If you ate one of those cutlets completely cooked, it'd be as if you're actually consuming a quarter to half a bottle of NyQuil."
As if that weren't dangerous enough, there is another risk to preparing NyQuil chicken - according to the doctor, "By cooking a medicine with multiple drugs in it on a stove top, you've aerosolized it and are most likely inhaling it. Inhaled, these medicines also enter your bloodstream really quickly and are not going past your liver for detoxification. The effects can be quite bad depending on how much you inhale."
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time "NyQuil chicken" has been a thing. It can be dated back to a 2017 tweet.
Best to listen to the experts and avoid it altogether.