BROOKE'S HOT WAAANGS

Hot Wings is one of those things that took quite a bit of trial and error until I got them down pat. One of the first mistakes I made was cooking them in my deep fryer. When I cooked my wings in my deep fryer the skin didn't crisp up enough to be able to stand up to the sauce. So I thought I needed to cook them longer, so I ended up with over fried chicken with squishy skin hot wings - not good eats!


So I will tell you what I do to make Brooke's Hot Waaangs (yes, you must say "waaangs not wings). Please note that I did not include amounts, it just depends on how much you are cooking and it isn't an exact science.

INGREDIENTS

• Chicken Wings
• Flour
• Oil
• Wing Sauce
• Butter

DIRECTIONS

1. Add enough oil in skillet to fry chicken wings, I figure enough so that half the chicken is under the oil, and when flipped the other half will be completely under oil. Just use your eye, it's not that hard :) Let this start heating up, I set my burner to med high.
2. Rinse chicken and PAT DRY with a cloth. Dry chicken makes for a crisper skin.
3. Dredge chicken in flour until lightly coated, place on wire rack until ready to add to the frying pan.
4. In small sauce pan add butter and hot sauce and cook until heated through.
5. Once your oil in your skillet is nice and hot, start adding chicken wings. Don't over crowd your pan!!
6. When chicken is golden brown, flip and cook the other side till golden brown. Remove and let drain on another wire rack.
7. Place cooked chicken in bowl and drizzle with hot sauce and butter mixture. Swish chicken around in bowl until thoroughly coated with the sauce.
8. Using tongs, place chicken on plate and pour the remaining sauce in bowl back into sauce pan to be used on the next batch of hot wings.
9. Serve with celery sticks and ranch or blue cheese dipping sauces.

I just packages of whole wings. You can purchase the drummettes, or cut your whole wings down. I usually will cut my own wings up since it is cheaper, and will do it if I am fixing them for others to enjoy. If it is just me and Ricco eating them, I don't bother separating the wing from the drumette and just cook them whole, and we just separate them while we eat them. Don't eat the wing tips though. It's really just your choice.



Sprinkle enough flour in a bowl over the wings and toss to lightly coat rinsed and PATTED DRY wings. Don't skip this step, it really helps to crisp up the skin which makes for a really good hot wing.



Just a light coating of flour is all you need! I don't add any seasoning to the flour since the wings will get plenty of flavor from the sauce.




Transfer to a wire rack until ready to cook. This just helps keep the flour on the wings from getting gunky and turning to a white sticky mess. If you don't have a wire rack, place them in single layer on some paper towels.



While the oil is still heating up and I have all the wings floured, I start the sauce going. I like Franks brand Hot Wing sauce, or another I like is to pick up the sauce from Buffalo Hot Wings. You can purchase these online or direct from the store. My favorite is the Parmesan Garlic, I could eat those until the cows come home! As far as how much butter, it depends on how much sauce you are using. For about the two cups I used, you need at least 1/2 to 3/4 of a stick of butter, just depends on how much you like the taste of butter. This only has about 1/2 a stick since it was the last of the butter I had, otherwise I would have used a bit more.


For some reason I forgot to get pics of the chicken cooking in the skillet! Whoops! But I think most of you know what that looks like anyway. Just add the chicken, making sure that there is room between each wing, don't over crowd your pan. It just takes them longer to cook and they just don't crisp as well. Mine took about 7 minutes on each side to cook through.




Once your chicken is cooked, transfer the cooked pieces to a wire rack to drain off any excess oil, this will also help keep the skins nice and crisp. As you can see, I just put my wire rack direct in my sink, that way any oil just drained right there for easy clean up. Again, no wire rack, just drain on paper towels.



Steam Vision!! These waaangs were so hot they fogged up my camera!


After letting the wings drain for a few minutes, place them in a bowl and drizzle with the hot wing sauce. Swish the wings around in the bowl until covered. Don't get to wild with the swishing, or you will end up with little red dots all over. I even use my tongs to get in there and turn the wings in the sauce. When you are ready to plate the waaangs, take them out with tongs, don't just dump them, too much sauce left on them will soften the skin up and ruin the crispiness we have been aiming for. Then just transfer the unused sauce back into sauce pan to reheat and be used on the next batch of wings to come out of the skillet.




While my wings are cooking I like to make my ranch dipping sauce. I just use a package of Hidden Valley Ranch mix and a container of sour cream. This time I added some cut up green onions since I had them on hand.




I also like to have cut celery to serve with my wings. One trick I do to keep celery nice and juicy is to cut the stalks into small sticks and them keep them stored in a Tupperware container filled with water. the celery just soak up the water and are crisp and juicy when I am ready to use them.




Now, you are ready to eat Brooke's Hot Waaangs! Enjoy!!