Note the wing sauce recipes provided.
Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Carefully add the tomato sauce, hot sauce, garlic powder, and onion powder. Stir well to mix. More hot sauce, garlic powder, and onion powder can be added if desired. Simmer uncovered, on low heat, for two hours. Stir occasionally.
Combine all sauce ingredients in a medium saucepan. Stir well to mix. Heat the sauce over medium-high heat until it boils. Reduce the heat to low or medium-low so that the sauce continues cooking at a low simmer. Cook, uncovered, for 75 minutes. Stir frequently to prevent the sauce from burning.
Whisk all of the glaze ingredients together in a medium bowl. Refrigerate until ready to use.
Whisk together all of the sauce ingredients in a small to medium bowl until well combined. Refrigerate until ready to use.
Place each chicken wing on a cutting board and hold it steady with your non-dominant hand. Use your dominant hand to cut between the joint at the top end of the tip. Discard the wing tip.
Spread the remaining portions open so that you can clearly see the joint. Carefully cut each wing at this joint.
Do not use your entire batch of sauce since you may want to use some later for basting or dipping. It is not necessary to marinate the chicken wings if you plan on slow-cooking them. To marinate, place the wings inside a resealable plastic bag and set the bag inside a shallow dish. Pour the marinating sauce into the bag and seal. Turn the bag several times to coat the wings, and set the bag inside the refrigerator as it marinates.
You could also spray the pan down with nonstick cooking spray. Aluminum foil is less messy, but the cooking spray will still prevent the chicken wings from sticking to the baking sheet. Choose a baking sheet or dish with shallow sides.
Hold each wing above the bag of marinade for 30 seconds, or until you no longer notice any marinade dripping off. Arrange the wings on your baking sheet in a single layer. Do not stack or pile the wings. Discard the excess marinade.
The oven must be completely preheated before you can begin cooking the wings.
When done, the chicken should no longer be pink in the center. Use an instant read thermometer to check if the chicken wings have reached 165 °F (74 °C).
Most broilers only have “On” and “Off” settings. If your broiler has “Low” and “High” settings, however, preheat it to the “High” setting.
A broiler pan is specially designed so that fat drips off meat as it cooks, so it is important that you use a broiler pan and not a regular baking sheet. Do not line the pan with aluminum foil or cooking spray, as doing so may pose a fire hazard. Allow the excess marinade to drip off the wings before placing them on the broiling pan. Discard the marinade. Arrange the wings in a single layer. Do not stack or pile them on top of one another.
As the wings cook, they should be 4 to 5 inches (10 to 13 cm) away from the heating element. Use tongs to turn the wings. Turn the wings after they become light brown on one side.
If using a gas grill, preheat the burners to medium-high. If using a charcoal grill, prepare a medium-hot charcoal fire. Coat the bottom of the grill in a single layer of coals, but pile more coals toward the center.
Allow most of the excess marinade to drip off each wing. The remaining moisture should be dried off with clean paper towels. The wings should be quite dry when you add them to the grill. Chicken wings are known to cause flare-ups, even without a wet marinade, so you need to minimize the dripping by wiping away as much of the marinade from the surface as possible.
Do not pile or stack the wings, since doing so will prevent even cooking. Do not cover the grill.
If the fire flares up or if the wings begin to burn, transfer the chicken wings to a cooler part of the grill.
You can also coat the wings with your sauce by basting them. Serve immediately after coating the wings.
Note that the chicken wings do not need to be marinated for this recipe, but you should still separate them into parts. The broiling steps can be skipped, if desired, but doing so will prevent the wings from developing their trademark crunchy skin. Most broilers only have “on” and “off” settings. If your broiler has a “high” and “low” setting, use the low setting. You only need the broiler to brown the wings, not to cook them fully. Do not line the broiler pan with aluminum foil or cooking spray.
Broil the chicken wings roughly 4 inches (10 cm) away from the heating element.
You will need to stack the wings in order to make them fit. This does not pose an obstacle to even cooking when using a slow cooker, however. If desired, you can line the slow cooker with cooking spray or with a specially-designed slow cooker liner to minimize sticking and make cleaning up easier.
If desired, you can give the wings a quick stir in order to coat them with the sauce. This is not often necessary, though, since the sauce will usually find its way from the top to the bottom of the slow cooker, coating each wing as it passes through.
You could also cook the wings on High for 2 to 2. 5 hours.
Keep the slow cooker set to Low as you dish out the wings. If your slow cooker as a “Warm” setting, you could also use that.
