Chicken Wing Madness!

What does March Madness mean to you? If you are me, (thanks to my dad and my tenure at an ACC school) it means all basketball all the time! It also means an opportunity to make sports food to keep all of our snacking needs in check. I actually first made these Chicken Wings for the Super Bowl this year and they were a huge hit! When I was buying wings, I picked up one bag and thought maybe two was a better plan, boy was that the right choice! They were gone in a hurry and I was pretty impressed with this especially for a first try. Like anyone, I love wings, but I don’t love the fried calories that comes with them. These are lightly smoked and then grilled and have so much flavor that I guarantee you won’t miss all the extra fat. For the smoking portion, I used Jack Daniels Wood Smoking Chips. Since I was a little short on time, this was a great option because they provided layers of flavor in one shot and were super easy even on our gas grill. I only smoked them for 25 min and then threw them back over the direct heat. I may try to smoke them a little longer next time, but they were great as is. We used Frank’s Red Hot BBQ Sauce this time because we had it on hand. Though I love the regular wing sauce, I think the BBQ is a little boring, so I threw a few extras in it (think a splash of Jack Daniels to go along with the wood chips and some Tabasco.) You really can use whatever sauce you like but this ended up not too spicy but lots of flavor. Grab some wings, wood chips and your bracket and get ready for the madness!

Kelly

Smokey Grilled Chicken Wings

3 Dozen Frozen Chicken Wings

1 Bag Jack Daniels Wood Smoking Chips

Aluminum Foil

Frank’s Red Hot Wing/BBQ Sauce

2 T Butter

Salt & Pepper

Wrap dry chips in foil, forming a cylinder shape leaving ends partially open. Place foil wrapped chips on heated lava rocks and turn on the burners leaving the other burners off. Allow the wood chips to heat in the closed grill until you can see smoke.

Place the frozen wings on the cool part of the grill away from the direct burners. Allow to cook for about 25 minutes and cooked through.

Prepare the sauce in a large bowl adding the butter. Remove the wings from the grill and season with salt and pepper then toss with the sauce in the bowl adjusting the amount of sauce as you like.

Turn on the rest of the burners on the grill to medium high. Place the wings back on the grill and cook for 3-5 min on each side until golden and charred.

Serve with blue cheese dressing and celery and carrot sticks. Enjoy!!