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| HTC m8 with instagram |
If I were to own a
restaurant, it would be a deep fried chicken wings restaurant. Deep fried wings, tossed in
various sauces, dripping with flavour and cheap as you like. My love affair
started at Duke’s Brew and Cue in London. Primarily, it’s a smoky ribs
restaurant with chicken wings as one of the side dishes. If you get the chance,
it’s well worth a visit.
I wanted to recreate
the wings I’d had so I jointed a pack of chicken wings, floured and deep fried
them, tossed them in a bowl of ‘anything I could find in the fridge and
cupboard’ sauce and chowed down. They were pretty good but hard to recreate and
nothing like the wings I’d eaten at Duke’s.
Scouring Pinterest and
the internet at large, there are hundreds of recipes for all kinds of wings, but I
thought I’d start at the base level and work from there. The buffalo wing, I
felt, was my starting point... and if I’m honest it’s a great place to start.
For my recipe, I
bought a pack of value chicken wings from the supermarket. Sainsbury’s seem to
stock them in more stores. Tesco stock them too, but only in larger stores and
I’ve yet to see them in the likes of Aldi. A pack of wings will usually set you
back less than £2, so they’re great value for money.
To prepare, take a
large kitchen knife and remove the wing tips. Cut the wings in half at the
joint and throw them into a medium/large zip-lock freezer bag. To the bag, add
a couple of heaped tablespoons of plain flour, a teaspoon of mustard powder, a
teaspoon of paprika and a teaspoon of salt (kosher, rock, sea or table. It
doesn’t really matter what you have in stock). Heat a large saucepan with
around 5-7cm of sunflower or vegetable oil. To test the heat of
the oil, throw in a little bit of bread. If it sizzles and browns, you’re
ready. Shake off the excess flour from the wings and add 7-8 wings at a time
into the hot oil. Set a timer for 4 minutes and give them a stir periodically
to make sure they’re getting good colour.
In the meantime, you
can make the tossing sauce to coat the wings. Heat up 2 tablespoons of unsalted
butter with a quarter teaspoon of black pepper, a teaspoon of honey and a pinch
of salt. You’ll need at least 2 tablespoons of a hot sauce of your choosing. I
like to use Cholula original hot sauce because it’s not too hot, however if you wanted a bit more spice you can try Frank’s
Redhot Wings sauce, Heinz Tangy Jalapeno sauce or even Nando’s hot peri peri. If
you’re an idiot you can coat them in a habanero or scotch bonnet sauce, but why
you’d want to do that is anyone’s guess.
When the 4 minutes is
up, remove your wings from the oil and drain on kitchen paper. Repeat
until all the wings are cooked. To make sure they’re all piping hot, put all
the wings back in the oil for a further 2 minutes until crispy and golden.
Once drained, toss
them in the buffalo sauce like you’re panning for gold. Once coated, pile into
a bowl and fill your face.
Goes very well with a
Caesar salad. Goes even better with a beer (see link for my current favourite).
NB. A lazier
alternative is to buy a box of frozen Southern fried wings to bake in the oven.
You need to cook them 20C higher and 5-10 minutes longer than it says on the
pack to get them nice and crispy. Toss them in the sauce and away you go. No way
near as good as the deep fried version but a hell of a lot less messy in the
kitchen.
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| Oven Baked Southern Fried Wings |
