Terina’s Wings And Pizza

So I was talking to a girlfriend of mine, Colleen, the other day and she brought up a place we used to order chicken wings and pizza from way back in the day.  Do you ever have one of those Aha! kind of memories that takes you back to a simpler place in your life?  While Colleen and I have many of those….we’ve been friends nearly our entire lives….for us, Terina’s Pizza was one of those things.

Terina’s was the only place in our hometown, at the time, that spicy chicken wings were on the menu.  They had a special for twenty bucks that was twenty five wings and a large cheese pizza.  I didn’t know it at the time (because I hadn’t lived in NY yet), but this pizza was the closest thing to a NY cheese pizza you could get.

The wings were crispy, drenched in hot sauce and we ordered from them all the time and it was customary to eat the whole thing on the floor right over the box.  I don’t know why.  Terina’s wings are the cause of years of disappointment afterwards when ordering wings from anywhere else.  Colleen feels the same pain of longing.  Here it is, nearly three decades and hundreds of hot wings later and still nothing has come close.

If you’re like me and you crave something a little low brow sometimes and you like hot sauce, this is for you.  And if you’ve ever tried to recreate this bar favorite at home because again, like me, you’re not a fan of hanging out in bars, and you’ve been disappointed, this is the wing recipe for you.  There’s a few simple tricks and it’s all about the chicken.  The pizza part is easy.

First, skip the frozen wings.  Most of them are covered in some chemical creation to “protect the chicken from freezing”, or so it says on the packages.  Gross.  Skip it.  Go for the family pack of fresh wings.  You’ll have to put in some elbow work cutting them, but at least they aren’t covered in some wierd chemical glaze.  Next, have a two part approach to cooking the wings…bake, then fry.  Finally, forget being loyal to one hot sauce brand.  Blending is the way to go.

Hot Wings

1 family pack fresh chicken wings
1 large bottle Tobasco original hot sauce
1/4 cup Franks Red Hot sauce
1/4 cup Tapatio hot sauce
1 stick butter
4 cups peanut oil

Preheat the oven to 400 and cut the chicken wings apart into 3 pieces at the joints of each wing using poultry shears or a cleaver.  Keep the two meaty pieces, the drum and the flat, discarding the tiny wing tips, keeping one wing tip aside.  Bake on 400 for about 10 minutes on a parchment lined baking sheet.

Meanwhile, heat up the peanut oil on medium high in a deep pot.  Use the one reserved wing tip to test the oil.  Combine all the hot sauces and the butter with a whisk in a bowl large enough to fit all the wings in.  Remove the wings from the oven and working in batches, fry the wings in the hot oil, and drain them on paper towels.

Toss all the wings into the hot sauce and serve with the leftover sauce remaining in the bowl, some ice cold ranch dressing, and some fresh celery and or carrot sticks.  And a cheese pizza!