This is an addendum to my original post on Hot-Wings which can be found HERE. Hmm...Maybe not an addition but a culmination of making and eating probably about 60 lbs of Hot-Wings these last 12 months. This post, I am hoping is the pinnacle of Hot-Wing experimentation. What am I saying? I love experimenting, but I am hoping this last endeavor will bring me the results I envisioned and hoped for. What can I say I am never satisfied. I am trying something a little different this time. There's not a lot of change from my previous post, but I'm will tweak a thing or two.
So what happened? I was making French fries the other night, and a foodie-thought overcame my senses... Hmmm... this could work. Twice fried potatoes is a thing and as you know good Fries are fried twice. Why can't this same thing work for Hot-Wings?
Objective- Very dry surface to facilitate browning aka Maillard reaction. Premise- Baking powder will dry out the skin and leave us something that will fry up to a crunchy crispy dark masterpiece. The first fry will dehydrate the surface and the second fry at a higher temp will crisp up the skin and make mahoganized magic-wings! Between the first fry and second fry, the chicken will be cooled down a bit (most likely 30-40 minutes). If you were to fry everything at a high temp until golden, you would most likely overcook.
In this post, I'm just going to highlight what I did. For a better story and pics click the link above.
1- First thing I did was breakdown the wings.
2- Dry-brine overnight with a dry-rub and vacuum sealed. If you add sugar, the wings will darken a bit during the fry. You can read about Dry-brining in the link above.
3- Sous-Vide them at 135f for 4 hours.
4- Cold shocked for a few minutes then tossed in a large colander to drain off moisture loss (purge).
5- Place on an 18 x 26 sheet pan on a rack and placed in a refrigerator to cool and dry for 8-12 hours.
6- Load up a Powdered Sugar dispenser with Baking Powder. You can read about why I used Baking Powder in the provided link above.
7- Evenly coat wings with Baking Powder and refrigerate overnight.
First Fry- They were fried at 250-260 for a few minutes. What does this accomplish? Have you ever ate a chicken wing that looked golden, but the fat underneath the skin had not fully rendered? Well, this takes care of that issue. Another important feature is the dehydration of the skin which helps with the browning on the second fry.
Can you do both on the first fry? Nope...it will overcook the chicken, and you will not get the same results. Believe me, I tried. You might achieve a pretty darn wing but the skin will not be crackly bubbly good, and you might overcook them too.
At this point, because my wife wasn't home (timing dinner), they sat out for about 35 minutes. I think 30-60 minutes would be optimum to cool off. It's the same reason we shock proteins when we Sous-Vide. Mitigating overcooking.
Heck now that I think about it why not refrigerate overnight. Yea.. yea it's a lot of steps, but if you want to make what I think is the perfect wing, it's worth the extra effort. One might say it's a lot of work but really is it work?
Second Fry- Oil started out at about 375-385 and fried until golden brown. Don't overcrowd the fryer.
Moreover, we tasted them without sauce too.
TOSS WITH SAUCE
Sauce- It was straightforward. Butter, Chili Garlic sauce, sriracha, sweet chili sauce and a touch of rice wine vinegar.
BOOM DONE
Review- This is a sob story that brought tears to everyone's eyes and hit a crescendo at which point there was silence. The silence was deafening due to everyone eating and not saying a word. After the awkward silence people just clapped and gave praise for what is a delectable perfect Hot-Wing. It kind of sounded like THIS.
Note: Maybe next time I will add another starch right before I fry. Why? Why not? I love trying different things.
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