I believe in science, the goodness of man, and sloppy chicken wings.
When it comes to making my own wings, the most important part is buying fresh, uncut, and unfrozen. Never ever buy frozen wings - those tiny bagged frozen precut wings that do little more than shrivel into deep fried charcoal. For the sauce above, the key is the traditional buffalo wing base of Frank’s Red Hot, with butter (not margarine!), sea salt, and the perfect blend of other spices mixed in a sauce pan with just the right amount of quality vinegar for exactly 12 minutes in 350 degree oil. Wing-making is very precise. Accept no substitutes.
Sweating through your shirt, resisting the urge to double over in pain, you begin to understand. Pain - followed by relief. Burn, followed by a pleasing, anesthetizing numbess. It’s like being spanked and licked at the same time. … At no point in your youthful misadventures would the offer of even playful discomfort have appealed … Pain, you were pretty sure, was always bad. Pleasure was good. Until now, that is. When everything started to get confused.
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I have never really been able to explain why it is I subject myself to foods that cause physical pain. I’m talking burn-my-nostrils, make-me-cry pain. Why? When I was eleven years old, I had my first extra sloppy, extra spicy chicken wing from a local pizza joint - mild by my current standards, but excruciatingly painful to a child who grew up in a salt and pepper only household. A friend of my older brother - Steven was his name, five years older yet never treating me like an inferior or annoyance as so many of my brother’s other friends did as I tried so desperately to butt my way into the teenage world - brought them over on a Friday night after a football game and asked if I was interested in having some. “They’re damn hot,” he warned me, and I did not hesitate to prove my worth, to show him that I was just as much of a hardass as the rest of them, scrawniness be damned. Those wings burnt - and I panted my way through eating a half dozen, sauce dripping from my fingers, my chin - but they burnt so good. I was captivated. Soon, my teenage love affair with jalapeno, serrano, and habanero peppers took off. Exploring atomic and suicide sauces with mandatory waivers became a priority. Middle school lunch competitions to see who could bring in and eat the spiciest sauce without blinking or taking a drink became a weekly occurrence. Nowadays, my more subdued adult self still has an addiction to adding ingredients which cause burning sensations and when asked, I have never really been able to explain it to friends and family. Reading Bourdain’s Medium Raw tonight, I think he did a damn fine job of explaining why it is those of us who love spicy foods enjoy it so much. |
I added a new sauce to my Tabasco fridge family today. Yeah, I’m that weirdo who puts Tabasco on his eggs, his mashed potatoes, his turkey sandwiches (but no, before someone asks, not ice cream). I even keep bottles at school and gleefully share it with students - usually the boys, who are eager to prove to the ladies how manly they are.
I almost couldn’t believe it when I saw the new sauce in the aisle, staring me right down, a playful but eager look on its face, just about asking me what took me so long to discover it. Well, don’t you worry, Mr. Buffalo Style, you’re going to get plenty of action. I’m making wings tomorrow.
Late night dinner to go with writing the final damn paper for this grad course. Thank you Dr. Professor Man for the extension. Sloppy hot wings probably are not great on the stomach after this past week of not eating, but whatever. We’ll call it grief food.
I suppose summer begins tomorrow for this guy.
Cooked some wings for the Steelers game tonight. From left to right: Buffalo Butter & Garlic, Sweet ‘n Spicy BBQ, and my award-winning Sloppy Hot Cajun.
Okay, okay - by award winning, I mean that it won “first place” at a wing cook off that my friends and I have held the past two years.
I do make all of my sauces myself - no pre-bottled mixes or barbecue sauces allowed as a base in my wing sauce creations. The other night, I was experimenting. I came up with a wing that I called Mediterranean Mesquite (try to figure that one out), and for another, I mixed butter, jerk seasoning, and rum together in an attempt to make a Caribbean-flavored wing… but let’s just say that it’s a work in progress.
