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So, I was working on a recipe for chicken wings when not long after I started, my husband basically took over. Just for the record my husband CAN cook, and I love it when he does – it just doesn’t happen all that often anymore! So I did not argue and said, “Yes, I’d love for you to take a shot at developing this baked chicken wings recipe” (i.e. make dinner tonight – wink wink).
Recipe for The Best Oven Baked Chicken Wings
And I must say they turned out to be the best oven baked chicken wings I’ve had and definitely rival the smoked wings we recently fell in love with at one of our favorite Charlotte restaurants, Rooster’s.
How to Get the Taste of Smoking Chicken Wings
Baking this knock-off version at home by emulating the flavor of their wood burning fire with smoked salt makes our house smell almost as good as their amazing restaurant, and it only takes 45 minutes to bake (instead of hours to smoke…not to mention you don’t have to tend a fire!). So, just in time for the Super Bowl – enjoy!
What to Serve With These Homemade Wings
Chicken wings make for an awesome family meal that just about everyone loves! Here’s a few ideas for side dishes you can add to make it a complete, whole food meal to satisfy even the hungriest diners. Try some slow cooker baked beans, oven baked cheese fries for some extra crunch, and Mexican street corn salad to bring it all together!
Here’s a video on how to make our best oven baked wings:
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The Best Oven Baked Chicken Wings!
Ingredients
- 3 pounds chicken wings (about 3 dozen wings total)
- 1 tablespoon pure maple syrup (or honey)
- 2 1/2 teaspoons pepper
- 1 1/2 teaspoons smoked salt ((this recipe would not be the same without the SMOKED version versus regular salt…I found it at our grocery store and it’s worth the extra effort if you don’t already own some))
- 1 teaspoon thyme (dried)
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 1/2 teaspoon oregano (dried)
- 1/2 teaspoon red pepper ((ground cayenne))
Optional Accompaniments
- celery
- ranch dressing (homemade (see link in notes))
Instructions
- Place the cooling rack on top of a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil and set aside. Pre-heat oven to 425 degrees F.
- Pour the maple syrup into a large mixing bowl. Add the wings and mix with your hands to evenly coat the wings. (Note: If your wings are fairly wet, pat dry with a paper towel first, otherwise don’t waste your time.) Arrange the coated chicken wings on top of the rack, thick-skinned side down.
- Mix remaining ingredients in a small bowl and with a dry hand, evenly spread about half of the spice mixture on top of the wings. With your other “wet” hand, press the spice rub into the wings and then flip them over (we want the thick-skinned side up during baking for extra crispiness). Evenly spread the remaining spice mixture on top with your dry hand.
- Bake for 45 minutes on the middle oven rack. Serve warm and enjoy!
Do these get crispy? I have a hard time with wings….I find that they are still fatty when I bake them and it grosses me out. I like the skin to get crispy. Any tips?
Mine get crispy. You could always throw them on the grill if you want them more crispy.
I almost burned the house down making these. The syrup dripped to the bottom of the pan and burned to smoke. Perhaps my oven is too hot.
Anything that has grease or oil will cause a fire in your oven. Place foil at the bottom of your oven. A friend of mine caught her house on fire by warming up a tostada shell in the oven.
These are awesome!! I made them tonight to eat while we watched football bowl games. I followed the recipe exactly, and hubby and I both loved them! I don’t like spicy hot food, but the spice on these is perfect. And the little bit of sweetness underneath from the maple syrup was wonderful. Thanks so much for a delicious alternative to greasy, fried wings.
I made these pretty much as written. I used honey and I think it really helped seal in the juices and flavours. Crispy on the outside and still somewhat moist on the inside, perfect! All dry ingredients through a mortar and pastle. I did back off on the red chili flakes because we Canadians can’t handle it! Wings got dark real fast – around 20 – 30 minutes, so I covered them with tinfoil. I do think some garlic powder was missing here. Served with fresh local veg and light ranch dressing. Thank you for the inspiration. Will attempt again!
I finally tried making these and I didn’t smell the smoked salt at all while they cooked. I used alder smoked salt but from another company on Amazon. I did smell the thyme and oregano as they were cooking.
I found these to be good but a bit on the peppery side. Temp and time for my electric oven was dead on! I also recommend splitting the wings with a sharp knife, removing and discarding the tips.
I feel a bit more accuracy in amount of wings is needed; from my local grocer 3 lbs. is not 3 dozen wings, only about a dozen. Maybe we just have really big chicken wings here?
I’d make this again with some modifications of my own; grind the smoked salt to fine, tone down the pepper.
You used whole wings, didn’t you? She meant ‘wings’ like you’d get at a restaurant, which are split and the tips cut off, which would give you more ‘wings’ total ;-) So, you’d have a flat piece, a miniature drumstic, and then the tip when you cut them up.
I think you missed what I wrote;”I also recommend splitting the wings with a sharp knife, removing and discarding the tips.”
Not much meat on the tips so I toss those. Still does not add up to 3 doz. and I feel this is critical as it affects the overall ‘peppery’ of each piece. (I even added in two very large breasts.)
Still experimenting with this and will fold it into my other wing recipes.
Just made these today. I baked these for 25 minutes instead. They are super yummy. Your spice mix makes these chicken wings taste like breakfast sausage. Thanks for sharing your awesome recipe!
THE BEST OVEN BAKED CHICKEN WINGS! Yes, they were! I doubled the recipe and used 5# of fresh wings. Because we love sauce, at 40 minutes I brushed some BBQ sauce on half the wings, baked 5 minutes, turned and brushed the other side and repeated the 5 minutes. They were ALL amazing! Neither my son nor I could decide if we liked the plain or the sauced wings better. I may be making another batch this weekend because they have already disappeared and would be terrific packed in lunches this week! Thanks for the fantastic recipe!
Can I use drumsticks for this instead?
Hi Lucy. Drumsticks should work, too.
i made these today and we LOVED them! I had to use the hickory liquid smoke mixed into the syrup instead of smoked salt as I could only find it as a small jar for $12.99 at whole foods which I thought was unreasonable. We didn’t think it adversely affected the final result as they were so yummy!
Also I just slowly added the spices into the bowl, tossing it every time I added about 1/4 of the spice mix.
2 questions:
1) can you grill these?
2) how do you get the maple syrup most affordably? I am loving it in your recipes, but it is fairly expensive (more trouble for baked items, which require larger amounts, than this)
Hi there. Grilling them should work, too. I find Costco to be the most affordable place to buy pure organic maple syrup. You can get a liter for $12.99.
I made the oven baked wings. I used a 4 pound bag cause I don’t have anything to measure a 3 pound bag. I didn’t realize u had to use a paper towel to dry them off…now I know because you will lose seasoning…I use my blow dryer to help dry the wings since I had already added the seasoning mix…added a little more seasoning on top before I stuck them in the oven…I think with more seasoning it will be a little good.. they weren’t bad but no one wanted seconds…my kids that is….great for people wanting to lose weight
Thanks for the recipe, super simple but a great combination of flavors. I did not have smoked salt. I used smoked paprika though, and they were extremely good! I also put this on chicken thighs and it was great! Thanks
This is for everyone who is like me and lives in a small town, and wouldn’t be able to find a specialty ingredient like smoked salt. I have fallen in love with Spicely Organics, and they have a hickory smoked salt. Even better, all orders qualify for free shipping.
http://spicely.com/collections/hickory-smoke-salts/products/hickory-smoked-salt-grinder
I just made these last night after ordering the smoked salt on Amazon (thank you for the link!). These were wonderful! Even my husband, who loves wings, said they were better than any restaurant! I loved the crispiness and the salty, smoky flavor. I can’t thank you enough for this website – I’ve learned SO much over the years and absolutely LOVE the recipes!
Great wings! Love the crispness and the texture, but I need to cut down on the back pepper next time! Too much for me. I could not find smoked sea salt, so I used good Hawaiian Alaea Sea Salt and smoked paprika. Thanks for the recipe! Easy and delicious…I will definitely make again!
I don’t have smoked salt, but I do have smoked paprika. I wonder if that will have the same effect. I guess I will find out!
I always sub smoked sea salt-paprika combinations for regular sea salt and smoked paprika, and every recipe tastes fantastic.
These were great! Loved every bite and my kids even liked them despite the spicy kick! Thanks!
These were great! Loved every bite and my kids even liked them despite the spicy kick! Thanks!
I loved these! I was excited to try to bake wings BUT my husband came home early and insisting on putting them on the grill—could not complain! I will make them again because they were so so good! Loved the spice kick it had! Unfortunately I did not have any homemade dipping sauce, but found some I plan on pairing with this dish:)
These look delicious and I can’t wait to try them soon! I need to buy the oven friendly cooling rack first; thanks for sharing a link to that!
http://www.ourfrontdoorlookingin.com
Is the red pepper, red pepper flakes?
My cooking buds have never heard of ‘red pepper’.
Thanks
Gayla
Red pepper is also known as cayenne pepper.
These were delicious and a big hit with our guests!
Hi. Just found your site, and I love it! I have Celiac Disease and have not been feeling great lately, so I started looking into real foods and your site popped up! With some minor adjustments for gluten free (me) and nut free (my kids), this is totally doable! Thanks so much :)
I used this recipe with some thighs and legs. Cooked them in a roaster with water in the bottom to keep the chicken moist and added an additional 15 minutes in cook time. I also used an additional tbls of maple syrup as there was more surface area to cover. They were AMAZING. My husband said it was the best chicken I ever made. THANK YOU!
Hi Lisa,
I tried your recipe and it’s FANTASTIC! I did not only use the chicken wings, but other parts of the chicken like the legs and the recipe is still perfect.
Thanks for sharing!
Karla
These were delicious! I am a klutz and had trouble figuring out how to follow the wet and dry hand direction (true confession) so I added most of the dry ingredients to the large bowl and shook to coat. After putting the wings on the pan, (just the top of the broiler pan) I sprinkled the rest of the seasoning equally over. Everything stayed on, it was super easy and did I say delicious?
This was the best chicken wings recipe which gives the yummy flavor.It seems to be so great,that from now onwards no need to go out to have chicken wings.
These turned out great. Tons of flavor! We didn’t have smoked sea salt so we took the sea salt we had from Peru poured some liquid smoke on it and put it in the oven until it dried. Probably defeated the real food purpose but we stuck with the rest of the recipe and were not disappointed.
My husband would love to eat these; I’m not certain he would love to cook them!
I recently saw organic chicken wings at Market District for the first time and was so excited, but didn’t know where to start with a recipe, so this is perfect!! I’ve never heard of smoked salt, so I’m ready to expand my horizons on that, too! Thanks for the recipe!
Husbands are such talented cooks! WHY don’t they do it more? ;) LOL….my husband always makes lovely hot and honey mustard wings for the superbowl!!
These were the best wings I’ve ever made at home. Now if I can just find a Real Food alternative to Durkee Red Hot I may be able to convert my husband as well. :-)
A few notes on this recipe:
1. Prep time took longer than I anticipated because I needed to cut the wings up into smaller pieces. I’ve never made wings before so maybe I should have looked for something else at the store?
2. I found the smoked salt in my regular grocery store spice isle. It’s by McCormick and in a bottle with a grinder built in.
3. I put the wings in a large plastic bag and poured the syrup in to mix. Then I opened the bag, poured in most of the spice mix and tossed it around again. Saved the last 1/4 of the spice to top the chicken with once they were on the pan.
4. I did use a meat thermometer to verify that they had passed 165 before eating.
Overall, great recipe. These wings were the first thing gone.
Thanks for the instructions. Mine always stick to the foil & make a mess…….. the rack is PERFECT; keeps the wings from gluing themselves to the foil. So much better!
Found the smoked salt in a specialty section of our usual grocery store in town. It’s unfair to poorly rate a recipe because you can’t find an ingredient.
These are great! They even refrigerate well and were delicious the second day. They are sort of in between Asian wings and spicy wings. I added a little extra maple syrup and pepper flakes. I would make these again!
Good recipe, way too spicy for my kids (11 & 5). I cut back on the pepper (only used 2tsp), prob will only use one and used 1/4 tsp red pepper (may omit all together). Otherwise very easy and yummy recipe. But for those making for kids…cut down on the pepper. Too spicy!
Do we need to thaw the wings out first?
Chrissy, yes if you are using frozen wings you must thaw first.
Wings are something that I have always shied away from making because I thought they were difficult and I also try not to deep fry (and thought this was the only way to make them!) I couldn’t believe how easy and delicious these were! The amount of pepper was a little much for my kids so I might cut down on that next time, but overall such a great recipe!
these were soooooo good! made them yesterday for the Super Bowl and they were a HUGE hit. I had to use more than 1 tsp of maple syrup though to get them covered. I’m thinking next time I might brush it on vs dunking them? Anyway, the flavor was amazing and everyone raved about them!
Hi Kate, so glad you and your guests liked them! The recipe calls for 1 tablespoon (Tbsp), not 1 teaspoon (tsp), but maybe that’s what you meant. Regardless, 1 tablespoon does result in only a very thin coating of maple syrup, but believe it or not it does make a difference in flavor. – Jason
Its very unfortunate that someone gave this recipe 2 stars before making it just based on the fact that it asked for sea salt.. I made these for the superbowl last night and they were delicious! I bought cherrywood smoked sea salt from whole foods. It was a fairly large container for $9.99. I am sure I could have gone to a publix or kroger and found some less expensive but I plan to learn how this new ingredient will work into other recipes of mine. Will be making this again!
Next time, look in the bulk section at Whole Foods. My Maryland location has an array of salts available in bulk – so you just get what you need for very little investment!
I made these last night for a superbowl party and they were a hit! Thank you so much for this recipe! I felt great about serving them and eating them!