Dad’s Homemade Buffalo Wing Sauce

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Did you grow up with a traditional pizza night every week? What about a wing night? Or maybe you combined the two. Brilliant.

I definitely grew up on one favorite pizza shop (Penso’s, family owned in my home town and still our favorite to this day), but we hopped around when it came to visiting restaurants for wing night. And for some reason I remember that often being Thursdays. But while we found plenty of great spots to grab wings at a good price over the years, I’ll likely choose these baked wings tossed in homemade sauce any day….that I feel like cooking 🙂 And honestly, you don’t even have to feel that motivated to make these; the effort is minimal and the sauce takes a true five minutes to make on the stove.

You’ll want to get the wings going first and make the sauce while the chicken is broiling. If you can find split wings at the grocery store, that’ll make your life easier from the start. If you can only find whole wings, you can also split them at home using a sharp knife…which I rarely attempt and in those cases just bake them as is letting down real chefs in kitchens all around the world haha

Pat the chicken wings dry as needed and place them on a foil covered baking pan. Sprinkle with black pepper, place in oven and broil on high for fifteen minutes. At fifteen minutes, turn the broiler off, flip the wings and then broil for another fifteen minutes. If a good bit of grease is already laying on the foil, feel free to move the wings to a new foil covered pan as you flip and before you broil them a second time.

While the wings are broiling, add all six sauce ingredients to a small saucepan over medium heat and stir together as the butter melts and everything mixes together. Reduce heat and allow the sauce to cook down slightly so it gets a little thicker. That’s literally it. The recipe calls for half a stick of butter (four tablespoons). I tend to keep with this amount, but you can go up to five tablespoons if you’d like (Dad does) and that helps with the sauce sticking to the wings a bit better. Set aside a small cup of sauce to use for later; you’ll toss the wings directly in the saucepan.

Back to the oven…turn the broiler off and remove the wings from the oven. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Use tongs to blot each wing on a paper towel, toss in sauce and place on a new foil covered baking pan. Once all wings have been tossed in sauce and transferred to the new baking pan, place back in oven and bake for 15 minutes or until fully cooked. Remove from oven and brush on extra sauce as desired using the sauce you reserved in a small cup earlier.

That’s all it takes for the wings! We typically like to serve them with pretty traditional sides…fries (we love the rosemary with sea salt fries by Alexa) and of course we serve carrots and celery with ranch or blue cheese dressing. Here’s the great part though. This sauce works perfectly well with shredded chicken and I suspect just as well with cauliflower too in case wings are just not your thing. I haven’t tried it with cauliflower yet, but the shredded chicken is super simple. Just slow cook chicken breasts or chicken thighs in the crockpot or oven in a little bit of broth. When the chicken is done, remove it from the crockpot or roasting pan and discard the broth & juices. Shred the chicken, add back to the crockpot or roasting pan, pour sauce over top and toss to mix. Let that sit for a little bit to marinade and then serve as sandwiches, wraps or in salads. I go for the salad option more often than not. so good!

Check out the full recipe below and let me know how you choose to use the sauce! And if you photograph your delicious creation and share on Instagram, tag me! I’d love to see! @pinch.of.parsley 🙂

Print Recipe

Dad’s Homemade Wing Sauce

The perfect sauce to toss your wings, shredded chicken or cauliflower in for dinner!

Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 5 minutes

Ingredients

  • 4 – 5 Tbsp butter* sliced
  • 1/2 cup Frank's Original Hot Sauce
  • 1 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
  • 1 Tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
  • 1 Tbsp Lemon Juice freshly squeezed
  • 2 Tbsp Honey

Instructions

  1. Add all ingredients to a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir frequently as butter melts and all ingredients mix together.

  2. Reduce heat and allow the sauce to cook down slightly so it gets thicker.

  3. Remove from heat. If not quite ready to use, be sure to stir again before tossing wings or cauliflower or before pouring over shredded meat. Enjoy!

Recipe Notes

*You can use 4 or 5 tablespoons of butter depending on preference. As noted within the post, using 5 tablespoons will help the sauce stick to wings a bit better!

Have a beautiful day!


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