Baked Hoisin Sauce Chicken Wings

Chicken wings are a staple of American gatherings because they're easy to make and to eat, require very little cooking, and are also budget-friendly. Most cooks have a favorite sauce to coat the wings, like classic buffalo or honey-mustard. Hoisin sauce is not a common sight, though it might be once you've tried this recipe. Hoisin sauce is a boldly flavored preparation that is commonly used in Cantonese cuisine to season all sorts of meats or to dip doughy and fried preparations in, like egg rolls or pork buns. Our chicken wings coated with Hoisin sauce make a great appetizer or main dish—depending on the quantity you serve per person—and are wonderfully succulent bites that are easy to make and delicious to eat. Most of the work is hands-off, during which you can prepare other dishes to serve alongside the wings, like a fresh salad and plain steam buns, which counterbalance the rich flavor of the wings. A quick marinade in the sauce, alongside honey, seasonings, garlic, and ginger, provides the wings with an injection of flavor that will enhance once the wings go in the oven for just 35 minutes. Keep leftovers for up to 3 days, covered, in the fridge.

Although many variations on the sauce exist, the common threads are its dark, thick texture and a deep soy flavor derived from fermented soybeans. Sweet and savory Hoisin sauce is filled with spices like chili peppers and garlic, and although its name is the abbreviation for the Chinese term for "seafood sauce," the sauce in fact doesn't have any seafood in it, and it's not commonly used to season or complement any type of seafood. Used widely in Vietnamese cuisine too, the sauce is included with a variety of proteins like pork, chicken, beef, duck, and plant-based proteins like tofu and tempeh. In its true form, Hoisin sauce is not gluten-free, as it contains wheat-derived ingredients used as thickeners, but tamari-based gluten-free sauces do exist. Hoisin sauce is easily available from Asian grocers, some upscale grocery stores, and surely online.

For your chicken, choose wings that look bright and pink, with white-yellow fat on top without easy-to-spot blood—some blood is normal, but too much is not a sign of freshness. Avoid wings that look dry or greyish. The flesh must be springy and it should have no evident smell of anything. Chicken wings are composed of three parts, the drumette, the wingette, and the wing tip. For our recipe, you can use the first two parts, which are also the most commonly used in most chicken wing recipes. You can buy them whole and cut them at home for a lower price, or buy them already cut for a little more money. Once game season starts you might find good sales on chicken wings and buy them in bulk at a convenient price. You can separate the wings in freezer-safe bags and store them for up to 6 months—cooked or uncooked.