Bull Wings on the 700 first time

[nygiant]

Have watched several videos on YouTube posted by guys at rec teq and I’m kind of confused. It seems depending on which video you watch, they give you different temperature and cooking instructions.

The one I am going with is one of the first ones I watched. I was wondering what you all think of this? I am brining the wings for three hours in 1 gallon of water with a half cup kosher salt and one cup of sugar. I was going to smoke them at 275° for about one hour to 1 hour 15 minutes.

Then crank up the smoker to 425° and let them go for 25 minutes. Apparently by this time the wings should have an internal temperature somewhere around 175° to 180°. Take them off and sauce them with whatever sauce you’re using. Put back on for 5 to 10 minutes and the internal temperature to pull them out should be between 195° and 200°. The guys ate them on the video and they looked as tender as a pork butt and they actually just pushed right off of the bone. Said they were super juicy too.

Just wondering if that sounds like a good idea for those of you who have more experience smoking wings on this than I do. This will be my first time. There’s a lot of BS’ing going on in this video and it’s quite annoying, but this is the video where I got the recipe from.

 

[Pacman]

Your idea is great and I'm sure you'll be happy.

Like most things "food" (I won't restrict it to smoking or BBQ), there are a zillion opinions. Here's mine.

I brine whole chickens, whole chicken breasts, etc. I've never felt the need to brine wings as I always felt, right or wrong, that small cuts would get "over-brined" too easily.

I also admittedly come from the old school that all good chicken wings are fried. It's familiar and delivers the correct "crunch yet juicy." I know a lot of people have had great success smoking/grilling, playing with temperature, or even using doodads like vortex cookers in things like Weber kettles.

Thanks to my son in law, I now follow this basic process. Smoke at high smoke (180ish) for about 30 minutes. Immediately deep fry just like always. Dress with your favorite sauce (I've got a great Thai garlic chili thing I concocted) or even salt and fresh cracked pepper.

The smoked then fried wings produced the most unique smoke kiss, beautiful carmel color, and crispy wings I've ever had. It is now my go to approach.

This is a "before" picture from a few weeks ago.

 

[nygiant]

Your idea is great and I'm sure you'll be happy.

Like most things "food" (I won't restrict it to smoking or BBQ), there are a zillion opinions. Here's mine.

I brine whole chickens, whole chicken breasts, etc. I've never felt the need to brine wings as I always felt, right or wrong, that small cuts would get "over-brined" too easily.

I also admittedly come from the old school that all good chicken wings are fried. It's familiar and delivers the correct "crunch yet juicy." I know a lot of people have had great success smoking/grilling, playing with temperature, or even using doodads like vortex cookers in things like Weber kettles.

Thanks to my son in law, I now follow this basic process. Smoke at high smoke (180ish) for about 30 minutes. Immediately deep fry just like always. Dress with your favorite sauce (I've got a great Thai garlic chili thing I concocted) or even salt and fresh cracked pepper.

The smoked then fried wings produced the most unique smoke kiss, beautiful carmel color, and crispy wings I've ever had. It is now my go to approach.

This is a "before" picture from a few weeks ago.

View attachment 15929

Wow! I bet those are really great wings. Might have to try that with round 2.

I just took them out of the brine not too long ago and rinsed them and put them in a bowl. Went around five hours in the brine. With having a half a cup of salt and a whole cup of sugar I’m hoping that sugar will help with the maillard effect when I turn it up to 425. Really should be interesting.

Going to toss half in a garlic Parmesan sauce and the other half in an Asian zing sauce.

 

[Motodad1776]

I never brine wings, just use half Cavenders Greek seasoning and half lemon pepper typically. I smoke at 275 until the skin is starting to get some crisp to it and the wings are close to done, I then put them in my air fryer at 400F until PERFECT......good as deep frying without the guilt and the oil.

 

[Buckeye1]

I haven't found a great method yet but have been doing low temp to high temp to crisp up.

Curious to see how they turned out for you. I love the recteq recipes but don't like their long videos. I have a short attention span .

 

[Motodad1776]

Poultry "ideally" needs to warm up/cook much quicker than it's counterparts, which is why anything lower than 250F in my honest opinion for poultry isn't a good idea.

 

[nygiant]

Well, they turned out awesome! So tender, you’d bite into the chickens and lightly tug, and the meat came clean off of the bone. Really crispy skin too. Almost like I cooked them over charcoal after letting them go for 23 minutes at 425. Juicy and not dry at all. Used 2 Buffalo wild wings sauces. Not sure if they were a little salty or the 5 hour brine was it. Not bad or overly, overly salty. But maybe brine for 2.5 hours next time. For the first time doing this, I am very satisfied with the final results.

First 3 pics, After 1 hour at 275

 

[nygiant]

These pics after 23 minutes at 425. Internal was 200-205. Nice crisp skin. Garlic parmesan sauce and Asian zing sauce.

 

[hallsofmontezuma]

The recipe seems legit. Personally I don’t usually brine wings (though I always do for thighs, legs, and especially breast). I smoke them on low (180) for about an hour, then crank it up to 425-450 (either on the grill or oven since the grill takes a while to heat up) and cook them until 190 or so.
If saucing, you can sauce at different times for depth: pre-smoke, post-smoke, and/or post cook.

 

[DesertRat]

Nygiant, sounds like a good plan. A couple smokes back I did wings myself for the first time. At least the first time that I remember. Looked at two or three videos whore written suggestions and as I’ve learned to do, just use them as guides so that I’m not trying to cook hamburgers at 200°, but really go ahead on my own and do it my way. I can’t say I’ve had a crashing failure in the couple years I’ve had this cooker and I’ve had a lot of fun doing it and I’m sure you will also.