Hot Wings!

Matt's Hot Wings

A strange journey recently saw me trying to do hot wings at home without frying.  You see, deep frying and I have a checkered history.  The inspiration came from Hooters (horrible wings on every level) and Chef John of "foodwishes.com".

Chef John had a recipe for Sriracha Hot Wings that promised crunchy skin out of the oven.  The secret was baking powder.  Yup, baking powder.  I'd heard about this in an article about the Maillard reaction on one of the sous vide sites but never thought it'd be practical or tasty.  I made his recipe and it was salty and off-putting.  It turns out that my powder was old and contained aluminum.  A small tin of fresh, aluminum-free powder later I made his recipe but it wasn't crunchy enough to warrant the odd taste that still rung through.  A quick check with Alton Brown suggested a pre-boil.  So that's what I do.

BTW, I leave the tips on the flat part of the wings.  The wife loves them when they get crispy and they provide a great handle.  If you want to cut them off, please do so.  Just be sure to boil them up with seasoning to make some chicken stock.  Don't waste 'em.

You'll need:

• 1-2 pounds chicken wings (separated into drumettes and flats with tips)
• 2- 3 Tbsp seasoning mix (I use Tajin classic plus some salt, cayenne, and pepper)
• a pot of boiling water
• cookie sheet with rack
• a big bowl
• your favorite sauce (or not)  (I will detail two below)

Set up your mise en place (MEP)

Boil the wings in the salted water for 12-15 min. Pat Dry. Preheat oven to 425F

Optionally you can lay them on the rack and refrigerate for an hour.

Toss the wings in your dry seasoning and arrange on the oiled rack.

Bake at 425 for 15min and then turn over with tongs.  I give 'em a shake to loosen before flipping.

Bake for 15 more min.  Remove from oven and let rest for 5 min.

Put wings in a bowl, cover with sauce and shake/flip to coat.

Eat!

Sauces:

Chef John's Honey Sriracha sauce is basically equal parts honey (I use agave nectar) and Sriracha, a splash of rice vinegar and a couple drops of sesame oil.  The wife loves this!  I usually err on the side of too much Sriracha.

Traditional Hot Wing sauce is unequal parts melted butter and Frank's hot sauce. It is the Franks that gets the extra representation in the sauce.  Try a 60/40 split.

I mixed 'em both together for this recipe.