- This article is about the food. For the roller hockey team, see Buffalo Wings (roller hockey).
Buffalo Wings, Chicken Wings, Hot Wings or Wings are chicken wing sections (called the wing and drum stick) that are deep fried and then coated in sauce. Traditional Buffalo style chicken wing sauce is composed of only two ingredients: a vinegar-based cayenne hot sauce and margarine or butter. Buffalo wings may also be prepared with breading and sauce. However, traditional Buffalo style chicken wings are not prepared in this way. Buffalo wings are named after the city of Buffalo, New York where they originated. In the Buffalo, New York area, the local residents do not refer to them as "Buffalo Wings". They are usually referred to as "Wings" or "Chicken Wings". The appellation "Buffalo" is now commonly applied to foodstuffs other than wings, such as Chicken fingers, Chicken nuggets, Popcorn Chicken, etc., that are seasoned with the Buffalo style sauce or variations of it.
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Preparation
Tabasco sauce (traditonally Frank's Red Hot Sauce) along with butter or margarine is used in preparing the sauce. Buffalo wing sauce can be made with a variable amount of heat/spiciness with the names of these sauces generally corresponding to the level of heat. For example: (Hot Sauce:Butter)
- Mild - 1:1
- Medium - 1.5:1
- Hot - 3:1
- Suicidal - +3:1
In most cases, each contains the same base sauce but varies in the amount of butter and hot sauce used. Purists argue that margarine, rather than butter, is required for the right consistency and taste. Wings can also be served dry with the sauce on the side. Buffalo wings are typically served with celery sticks, carrot sticks and blue cheese dressing
History
Buffalo wings were first prepared at the Anchor Bar, located at 1047 Main Street (between North Street and Best Street) in Buffalo, New York, USA on October 3, 1964, co-owner of the Anchor Bar with his partner Frank. Upon the unannounced, late-night arrival of his son, Dominic (and several of his friends from college), needed a fast and easy snack to present to his hungry guests. It was then that he came up with the idea of deep frying chicken wings (normally thrown away or reserved for stock) and tossing them in Frank's Red Hot hot sauce. In the Buffalo, New York area, pizza parlors traditonally also serve Buffalo Wings. They are either served alone or as part of a combo with pizza. Serving Size Names
- Single = 10 wings
- Double = 20 wings
- Triple = 30 wings
- There is no moniker used for a 40 wing order. It is usually ordered as two doubles.
- Bucket = 50 wings
Buffalo wings have nothing to do with the buffalo (American bison), although this misconception is often played for humor. The most notable examples of this are an early Bartles & Jaymes commercial ("To be honest, I didn't even know that they could fly"), and a Newlyweds episode when Jessica Simpson explained why she didn't order them ("I don't eat buffalo"). Winged buffalo have also been depicted on logos for Buffalo wing sauces and restaurants. The popularity of Buffalo wings has grown such that there are now chain restaurants that specialize in Buffalo wings. Buffalo-style chicken wings are also frequently used in competitive eating events, such as Philadelphia's Wing Bowl and at the National Buffalo Wing Festival, held every Labor Day weekend in downtown Buffalo.
Variants
While wings served in Buffalo are almost always unbreaded. Some national restaurant chains, such as Hooters, do use breaded wings. In the course of proper preparation of breaded wings, the breading soaks up the hot sauce, making the flavoring more even and the wings less messy to eat. In addition, restaurants may include on their menus a dish called "Boneless Wings". Boneless wings usually are made of breaded chicken breast meat strips. They are called "Boneless Wings" because they are tossed in wing sauce like "Buffalo Wings, although without the sauce they bear more resemblance to chicken strips or tenders. Another variant is "Buffalo lips", bite-sized breast nuggets that are flour-coated, deep-fried, then soaked in a Tabasco-butter sauce.
Some wing restaurants offer wings spiced with other styles of sauces or hot spices, such as Cajun or Caribbean-style jerk spices. Another style popular in the Buffalo, New York area are wings "from the pit" or simply "pit". These wings are fried, tossed in barbecue sauce, then placed on the grill for a quick charring. Sometimes the barbecue sauce will have hot sauce mixed with it, but this is not needed. Lemon garlic or Greek wings are a non-spicy variant also offered by some restaurants. Also, these wings are breaded and fried as opposed to being just fried. Some restaurants bread their wings and then toss them in a mixture of seasonings, varying from hot to mild, rather than a sauce. Restaurants that serve Buffalo-style wings also frequently serve other dishes, or "bar food", common to taverns in the snowbelt: fried cheese sticks (generally breaded with herbs, and made with mozzarella or provolone cheese), pizza logs (pepperoni, mozzarella cheese and pizza sauce rolled in won ton or egg roll wrappers and deep fried), potato skins covered in cheese and bacon, jalapeño poppers (jalapeño peppers stuffed with cream cheese and deep fried in batter), fried mushrooms, pepperoni balls (fried dough or bread stuffed with pepperoni), french fries, waffle towers in the northeast, and so forth. Wings have gained such popularity that there are documented "best practice" eating techniques for wings, e.g., the "small bone twist and smash technique".[1]
References
- ^ smash Cluckbucket: Chicken Wing Eating Techniques; The Smash (html) (English). Internet Hot Wing Database. Cluckbucket.com. Retrieved on November 28, 2006.
