Baked Sweet and Spicy Asian Wings

Every year Puppy Daddy and I host an extremely exclusive Super Bowl party. So exclusive, in fact, the only guests are the Whippets, Puppy Daddy and me. Thought the guest list is small, we make a big deal out of the food. Over the years we have many different themes from pub food, to Mexican to last year's Super Fry when everything we ate was made in the deep fryer. I know, super unhealthy, but it was so yummy! This year I decided on an Asian theme. The menu included Crab Rangoon, Pot Stickers and Asian Wings. I put in many hours prepping food ahead, but unfortunately 1 of the three dishes did not turn out so great, the Pot Stickers. Although the filling was delicious, the dough for the dumplings was hard to work with and as much as I tried to get it nice and thin it turned out thick and sticky when cooked. I do think the filling would be great in lettuce wraps and I made a killer dipping sauce, so be looking for that recipe soon!

The wings, however, were fabulous. I am a huge chicken wing fan. Usually I prefer hot Buffalo wings with lots of blue cheese dressing, but these wings my be my new favorite.They are both sweet and spicy with a definite Asian taste. To cook the wings I used a method by Alton Brown, oen of my favorite Food Network personalities. Every method of his that I have tried has produced the best possible result. These baked wings come out really crispy like fried wings. In fact I like them even better than fried wings. To make the wings you steam them for 10 minutes and then let them sit uncovered in the fridge for 1 hour. Then bake them for 40 minutes, turning them 1/2 way through the cooking time.

Next it's time for the sauce. I did some research on Asian wing sauces and found that many of them called for plum jelly. Since I try to avoid sugar in my diet, I used sugar free blackberry jam...FABULOUS! Just warm the jam on the stove with some soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, grated ginger, grated garlic, minced onion and plenty of crushed red pepper flakes. When the wings finish baking pour the sauce over them and bake for another 10 minutes.

I served the wings with a dipping sauce made from ranch dressing mixed with Asian chili sauce with garlic. It was the perfect accompaniment for the sweet wings!

Ingredients

Wings
20 - 24 chicken wing drummettes
water

Wing Sauce
1 cup blackberry jam or plum jam
1/3 cup soy sauce
1/3 cup rice wine vinegar
1 TB grated garlic
1 TB grated ginger
1 - 2 TB crushed red pepper flake

Dipping Sauce
1 cup Capital Hill Ranch Dressing or your favorite ranch dressing
2 TB Asian chili sauce with garlic

Directions
Place a 6-quart saucepan with a steamer basket and 1-inch of water in the bottom, over high heat, cover and bring to a boil.

Remove the tips of the wings and discard or save for making stock. Using kitchen shears, or a knife, separate the wings at the joint. Place the wings into the steamer basket, cover, reduce the heat to medium and steam for 10 minutes. Remove the wings from the basket and carefully pat dry. Lay the wings out on a cooling rack set in a half sheet pan lined with paper towels and place in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Replace the paper towels with aluminum foil. Roast on the middle rack of the oven for 20 minutes. Turn the wings over and cook another 20 minutes or until meat is cooked through and the skin is golden brown.

While the chicken is cooking prepare the sauce. Put all ingredients in a sauce pan. Simmer for 5 - 10 minutes. When wings come out of the oven, pour sauce over them. Return to the oven for 10 minutes.

To make dipping sauce just combine ingredients in a small bowl.