Fried Baked Hot Wings

February 13, 2015 · 0 comments

in atlanta, cooking at Home, dining out

I’ve chronicled it times, but hot wings are my side piece, and there are very few instances that would cause me to swipe left. I’ve seen many attempts to make a solid baked chicken wing, but there are just , and fried wings will always best baked ones.

However, a recent conversation with the good folks over at Wild Wing Cafe in Anderson SC, led me to consider another approach. See, I stop at this Wild Wing on the way from SC to ATL on occasion (occasion = they know my name and my order without asking) and I quite enjoy their wings. They are plump and flavorful, and not doused with sauce, which can result in a cold, soggy wing especially near the end of the basket. Wild Wing Cafe’s stay firm and crispy, and enjoyable to the last drumette. This is their lemon pepper, my favorite.

Hot Wings

I’m told Wild Wing heard customer feedback of wings getting cold too quickly and took a simple approach after they fry the wings and sauce them – they throw them in the oven for just a couple minutes.

This keeps them warm, and while I’m not sure how much of this is intentional, the sauce somewhat adheres to the wing, the flavor becoming one with the chicken, as apposed to a saucy coating with the aforementioned issues. Those who prefer a sauce wing simply get the sauce (or more sauce) on the side.

I decided to recreate at home, frying a few up and saucing in Frank’s, butter, and super hot cayenne.

I laid down a nice layer of additional sauce and plated that bad boy for a late night Instagram feature, where it received more likes than my recent meal at l’atelier Robuchon in Vegas. Super pleased.

Reinforcement were called in for more opinion and research. My brother, a wing fiend of true dedication, tested a few out with me, though this time we went fry + sauce + bake + another toss in sauce.

This version would appease those who like the saucier wing, but the same effect of longevity and crispiness was achieved. and they were basically double sauced, the burn etched into the chicken by the 350F oven for two minutes, then the saucy phase two for finger-licking fire breathing. My brother seemed intrigued, though I think he was more concerned with the ulcer I initiated by using extra hot cayenne from BuHi Farmer’s Market.

It really shows promise, and could be an excellent method to try if frying a bunch of wings to set out at a pot luck or something similar. It will never best a wing right out the fryer, but it’s tough to scale that magic. You could also get creative with layering of flavors. Hot sauce, then oven, then ranch dry seasoning. Teriyaki based sauce + oven, then tossed in sriracha based wing sauce. Whatever.

But keep in mind, my heart will never belong to just one wing. Only a week later I was pressure cooking and deboning wings for quick frying later at a Super Bowl party.

As they say, variety, and hot wings, are the spice of life.

BONUS – some new sriracha buffalo wings they tasted me on (that’s right, super blogger wing sampling status achieved) at . A little sweet but not overly so like most eastern influenced sauces, a nice traditional burn. Would order again.

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