Put your hands up if you love crispy, crunchy, spicy chicken wings?
One of my favourite things to eat mostly as an act of undignified indulgence, but I’m usually left with Eaters Remorse afterwards for the oil slick that they usually come in, or the overbearing sickly sweet sauces. So I decided to give my own a go.

First things first, you gotta start with great quality chicken. Thankfully, I have my local friendly chicken farmer, affectionately known as “Chicken Dave” and he is the sharpest dressed farmer to be seen anywhere.

Dave’s chicken is slow grown and free range living happy lives and in return they gift him with the most delicious meat. Plump, moist and a proper chickeny tasting chicken – it’s the kind of chook I remember eating as a kid. So I would encourage you to seek out the best quality chicken you can find. Wing meat is cheap and can feed more people that you might imagine, so its a really accessible source of meat.

Many Southern Fried style chicken recipes call for you to clip off the wing tips. If you prefer to do this because you’re not of the bone-nibbling generation that I was born into, then fine – but PLEASE don’t throw them away. Add them to a pot of water and some basic stock veggies (celery, carrot, onion, herbs) and make a stock from them. Freeze them if you must, but don’t simply discard if you can help it!

This recipe is stupidly simple. Yes, it takes a bit of time, but thankfully hardly any of it yours! Getting the chicken in to marinade before you head to work in the morning or doing whatever needs to be done on the weekend means that all you have to do come the evening is dredge and bake.

Ingredients (this is for about 12 chicken wings, but is easily scaled up or scaled down depending on the number of people you are feeding):

• For the marinade:
• 12 chicken wings
• 450ml buttermilk
• Juice of 1/2 lemon
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 clove of garlic, grated
• Either: small pinch of hot chili flakes / 1/2 hot fresh chili (e.g. scotch bonnet) / 3 small dried hot chilies
• For the dredge:
• 250g plain flour
• 300g panko breadcrumbs
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tbsp smoked sweet paprika
• 2 tsp cayenne pepper
• Generous pinch of sea salt and grind of fresh black peppercorns

Method:

• In a large bowl, place the chicken wings and all of the Marinade ingredients, cover tightly with clingfilm or a lid.
• Place in the fridge for at least one hour. The longer the chicken can remain in the marinade the softer the chicken will be. This is thanks to the buttermilk and lemon juice breaking down the meat fibres to make everything really tender and juicy.
• When ready to cook, set your oven to 200 degrees Celsius. Line a baking tray with parchment.
• Prepare a bowl with the dredge ingredients.
• One by one, bring the chicken from the marinade, shake off any excess and pop into the dredge. Use one hand to lift out the wet chicken and one hand to flick the dredge mix over the wing.
• Transfer onto the baking tray and repeat.
• If you have an oil spray, spray a little over the wings. If not, use your thumb over the opening of a bottle of olive oil and slowly gently allow a few drops of the oil to fall over each wing.
• Place in the oven for 30 minutes until golden and crispy.

Serve them up with a crisp green dressed salad, chips and my Awesome Blue Cheese Sauce that take about 2 minutes to make. CLICK HERE for the recipe.

Enjoy…!