Chicken Wings – 4 Seasoning Taste Test

Chicken wings are always dangerous animal for me because of the “bite”. I want to incorporate so much into so little – smoke, seasoning, crisp-bite-through skin and of course, that moist chicken. After my last wing cook, I think I got it down, but I wanted to add a little bit extra to see how that impacts it.

That leads me to a little bit of a soapbox moment. At some point, you’ll see I’ll start doubling up on smoke posts. I sincerely hope that you see some growth with each one. I want you to be there with me as I journey through the smoking world. This site is only a year old, but my love for smoked food goes back a few years – I’ve run a gauntlet, I’ve failed and I’ll probably fail again – I hope when I post my next Chicken Wing post, you see some advancement.

For this one, I’m doing the same process, the same wood, same sauce – only I’m coating them with different seasonings. I know what I like – but I want to try other flavors as well. Let’s get to the contenders:

Tajin – “A Unique Blend of Mild Chili Peppers, Lime and Sea Salt”
Famous Dave’s Devil Spit – “The perfect all-purpose seasoning for heat-seekers. Only the hottest peppers are used to create the HEAT to flavor your Grillin’ favorites.”
Jayell Black Label XXX Hot – It doesn’t appear to be available anymore – Check out their site though, support local!
Kroger Nashville Hot – The only thing listed in their online description is: “kosher”, so that’s all you’re getting

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Recipe

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The Prep Table

The local market had a chicken sale, so I went all in. Scooped up a big ol’ pack of whole wings and looked forward to sharing them with you. When you order 8 wings at a restaurant, you get 8 drums and/or flats. These are the two parts of the bird arm, and I generally like them as one. I think you get better skin coverage and you’re using more of the bird. One thing I’ll always gripe about – and when I shared these picture pre-post with a buddy – he rightfully said “trim those up”. Ain’t no value to the tips of the wing. Some places will still cook them up, sauce them, make a great presentation and still give you the tips on there.

So you already know I’m chopping off the tips after that tirade. I want to get that skin dry before the cook and to do so, I employed a two-prong process: baking powder and exposure. Each wing got a soft dust of baking powder before I put them naked in the refrigerator for a few hours. The baking powder will draw out the moisture while the exposure in the refrigerator aids in the same.

I did all this PRE-TRIM, because I didn’t want to expose the meat to the same rigors. This was just a mindset-theory thing for me, but spoiler alert: It worked. Go ahead and give them a little baking powder love, toss them if you want, and let them relax in the fridge for a bit. While I did this, I made my bacon-wrapped onion rings – I told you that Sunday was a busy day.

I apologize up front for the lack of photos in this post. This was my last cook of the day after working up quite a hunger. This particular Sunday involved a seasoning reorganization, fresh batches of Meaty Bits Beef Rub and Fine Swine Pig Dust, three mason jars of BBQ sauce, dehydrating habanero peppers, and of course those onion rings.

I know what seasoning I prefer on a wing, and because I haven’t created my own yet – I needed to ensure which direction I wanted to go. This was as much gluttonous as it was informational. Tajin has always been popular and I was curious to see how it meshed with the sauce. Famous Dave’s was intriguing because I like a spicy seasoning – although I’ve never liked their products…especially their pickles. The Kroger Nashville Hot was a random purchase one day that sat in the cupboard – so I needed to use it on something. Lastly, the Jayell Black Label XXX still had a little in the container – I know this one is spot on, but let’s put it to the test.

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The Process

The smoker was going through the paces today, with the onion rings going from 250 to 400, and now we’re going back to the 250 for the bird. We’re still running the apple wood, and it was ready to go. After about 45 minutes, I again cranked the temp to 400 and got that Thermapen ready to pull these around 180 degrees internal.

I remember rushing around the house at this point. One of two things happened: 1. I pulled the wings and then rushed when making the sauce while they were still hot. Or 2. I cranked the temp, rushed to make the sauce trying to get done before they burned. Whichever it was, I hurried in making this. Real simple recipe: The small 5oz bottle of Frank’s Red Hot, stick of butter, couple splashes of Worcestershire, maybe a Tsp or two of cayenne pepper and some garlic powder. Heat it up slowly and you got yourself a hot buttery sauce.

Hooters is the only place where I prefer the “Medium” flavor sauce instead of the usual hot. I think it’s probably the butter, which is why this sauce is killer.

Wings are done, sauce is done – everything is looking good, but what’s looking better? Who will come out victorious? Will the Famous Dave’s seasoning win my heart after much disappointment?

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The Result

Full disclosure: Tajin gets a couple of cheater points, because that small little wing in the picture below? I ate that one separately, un-sauced. It captured the smoke, had the bite I wanted and the flavor was great! Tajin gets an unfair +1.

My opinion, this is what you want when you’re getting a smoked chicken wing. The Tajin (Far left) looked a little thin on the seasoning. The Devil’s Spit and the Jayell’s (The two columns on the right) have that perfect look – the blackened seasoning, the skin you know is bite-through perfect.. but let’s add some sauce.

So that’s the finished product. I chose 4 equally sized wings, I didn’t toss the sauce, I just spooned some on either side. Here’s a brief on each:

Column 1 – Tajin Seasoning – Very delightful. It wasn’t powerful in heat, but had outstanding flavor. It was a comfortable seasoning, and one I’d throw on for friends and family who don’t do spice like I do. Adding that illegal point given above – I give it a 8/10.

Column 2 – Kroger Nashville Hot – Boring. The sauce was good, but I didn’t get very much flavor at all from the seasoning. Granted, I didn’t exactly cover each wing, but I thought I’d get something. Easy score: 4/10 because the smoke and sauce made it. (I got rid of this seasoning after this post – I didn’t use it before, I won’t use it again).

Column 3 – Famous Dave’s Devil Spit – Salt bomb. Had a little bit of heat, but was so overpowered by salt. The rubs I make aren’t salt heavy, even the basic beef rub which is majority salt/pepper, but dear lord – I needed more beer after this one. I hated it. 2/10. One point for sauce, one point for smoke. (I got rid of this one too – Damn you Famous Dave.. you always disappoint me).

Column 4 – Jayell’s XXX – The perfect chicken wing. Perfect amount of spice with the cayenne hot sauce – hands down favorite. 10/10. There’s nothing I would do differently for this. When I looked up the Smokehouse, I no longer see this seasoning listed… I’m going to have to stop in and inquire – because this is my reference for a wing seasoning. Thank you Jayell’s!

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Recipe