How to Make Buffalo Chicken - Cooking Buffalo Recipes
When Buffalo chicken was made for the first time at the Anchor Bar in New York in 1964, the chicken wings were deep-fried and coated with a sauce made of melted butter and hot sauce. To complement the hot and spicy chicken, celery sticks and blue cheese were served as accompaniments. Today, more variations are known, but we will start with a basic recipe and turn in it into a complete guide on how to cook any Buffalo (not only) chicken recipe or dip.
Preparation Tips for Buffalo Chicken
Before you actually start cooking Buffalo chicken at home, here are a few tips. For starters, a pound of wings usually gives you about five standard sized wings. While planning how much chicken to buy, keep in mind that you should allow at least four to six wings per serving portion.
You also need to know how to store chicken wings correctly. You can freeze uncooked wings for a maximum of nine months. If you are freezing cooked wings, you can store them upto a month.
Cooking time for Buffalo chicken will vary depending on the quantity of wings and the recipe that you are following. If you plan on cooking drummettes, keep in mind that they take longer to cook as compared to double bone joints.
Cooking Buffalo Chicken – Instructions
To prepare the chicken wings for cooking, chop off the tip of each wing and then halve the wing at the joint. Season the wings with salt and pepper. You can either deep fry the wings or bake or even grill them. If you are deep-frying the wings, heat oil in a skillet till it reaches a temperature of 375°F.
Basic Recipe
Once the oil in the skillet has reached the right temperature, fry the wings in batches. Transfer each batch of fried wings onto paper towels to drain out any excess oil.
For the sauce, melt butter over a medium heat and combine it with the hot sauce and vinegar. Two tablespoons of butter mixed with two tablespoons of hot sauce would give you a mild flavor. For additional heat, just increase the amount of hot sauce. Once you have the sauce in place, place it in a bowl along with the wings. Now toss the wings well so that they are evenly coated with the sauce.
Variations
This is the traditional method of cooking Buffalo chicken (also called hot wings or chicken wings). However, you can find several variations to this recipe. Instead of wings you can use chicken breasts, cut them into strips and make Buffalo chicken strips. You can make Buffalo chicken meatballs from ground chicken. You can combine Buffalo chicken and pizza dough to create a Buffalo chicken calzone or make yourself a Buffalo chicken sandwich. Buffalo tenders can be baked or grilled in the spicy Buffalo style sauce to create a healthier version of Buffalo chicken.
The sauce used in Buffalo chicken is made of butter, hot sauce, cider vinegar and cayenne pepper. However, you can play around with the ingredients to create a sauce to suit your taste. You could substitute olive oil for the butter or use another type of vinegar for a slightly different taste.
How to Make a Dip for Buffalo Wings
Now let’s get to the dip that you would serve with Buffalo chicken. Blue cheese is the traditional choice for the dip.
To make this dip, you will need Blue cheese dressing, garlic, onion and parsley. Chop the last three ingredients and add them to the Blue cheese dressing. Chill the dip and serve it with hot wings. You can add or modify the ingredients of this basic dip. Those who don’t particularly enjoy blue cheese, often replace it with Ranch dressing.
You can make a more fancy Buffalo chicken dip by combining cream cheese, Ranch or Blue cheese dressing, hot sauce, crumbled blue cheese and cooked chicken. Bake this mixture for about 20 minutes in an oven that has been preheated to 350°F. You can serve this dip with celery sticks or chips.
