Let’s kick December off with a BANG! October was all about mutilation of the grizzly and the gruesome, with an unexpected stabbing and a one hitter quitter from GYM.
December is gonna be about cooking and family. Honestly, I wanted to post this around Thanksgiving, my favorite holiday of the year, but I had a baby on the way and we’ll, ISH happens. But tis the season, as we get to spend time with family, celebrate Jesus’ birth and thank God for all He has blessed us with.
Without further ado , let’s get into this!
You might be on the fence on whether Im the maker of meth, the bringer of death, or I’m just a wrongfully accused chef. I’ll let you be the judge of that, and don’t hold this 
against me.
If you check out my infamous meth lab creations you might be surprised at what you stumble upon.
Meth or chef?
Recipes on food or the ingredients for that crystal blue sky?
I rather enjoy “cooking” at home and have discovered that I am pretty decent at inventing and improvising food creations from your favorite restaurants.
On this particular Thursday, I’m going to recount the most literal meaning of the phrase “if you can’t take the heat, get out of the kitchen!”
I don’ know if you’re like me, but I really enjoy chicken wings. Those crispy, fried, fattening futher muckers. But, sometimes when I eat chicken wings they make me feel like crap shortly afterwards.
The chicken wing effect is real! Making my gut swell to maximum bloat-tastic-ness and just a general, blah.
So, I decided, “hey, maybe I should just make my own.”
But how does one do that if they don’t have a fryer? I don’t wanna just boil a bunch of oil in a pot. So what do I do?
Research!
In scouring the bowels of the Internet for the ultimate crispy skin chicken wing recipes I ran across a secret, key ingredient.
To achieve a crispy cluck-cluck skin, without the use of a traditional fryer, you MUST use baking powder. NOT baking soda. Baking soda is NOT a crisping agent and will make your wings taste terrible !
Now, I’ve had success making crispy skin chicken wings in the air fryer, but the air fryer is time consuming process AND can only be done in a limited quantity. You can ONLY air fry a maximum of 16 wings, even using a high capacity fryer.
But, on a beautiful Thursday night…we are gonna elevate, elevate and add some extra flavor !
Thursday is a smoker kinda night !!
Before smoking these clucker suckers, you have to break down the chicken wings. This requires transforming the whole chicken’s wing into a drummette and wingette. One chickens wing = 2 viable chicken wings (1 drummette and 1 wingette)
Now, I have a large-ish family, 6 of us in total and number 7 was born 4 days after Thanksgiving. 6 people, eating wings = a metric ass ton of time devoted to breaking chickens wings. It takes roughly 20 mins just to break down the chicken!
Why, you might ask?
Well, I’ll tell you. You have to break at least 20 chickens wings to get the necessary quantity. Not only that, but breaking chicken wings is just the first step.
If you didn’t know, moisture is your enemy in the hunt for a crispy cluckin’ chicken skin. In order to crisp that bastard up, you have to pat each drummette and wingette dry wirh a paper towel.
Every.
Single.
One.
In order to do it right, paying careful attention to detail that’s another several mins or more based on the wing quantity,
And that’s just the start.
Next, you have to season those bad boys. Insert another several mins of selecting and then shaking your favy spices onto the chickens wing. And the trick to this is that you add, a minimum of 1 TABLESPOON of baking powder to your seasoning.
Shake shake, rake rake, repeat…until it’s seasoned to your perfectionist standards.
Now it’s time to get the smoker going !
I get my pit boss smoker fired up, set it to 250 degrees and wait for it to reach temperature.
This is a great temperature to smoke your wings low and slow, infusing ultimate smoky flavor.
Once it hits 250, we ready!
I place 40 wingettes and drummettes into the smoker, close the lid, and leave them to smoke for 15 mins.
Feeling good? Feeling great?
Grake Den…for now.
15 mins pass by, no issues. I open the lid to the smoker and flip the wings over and continue to smoke them suckers at 250 degrees for another 15 mins.
Simple, right ?
30 total mins we are smoking the wings low and slow at 250 degrees. But, we aren’t done yet.
Next is where the ultimate crispy skin, mother clucker action happens. 250 degrees isn’t hot enough to achieve a crispy skin while keeping the wings moist on the inside.
So what do we do?
.
.
We gotta crank that effer up, raising the temperature to a reasonable 400 degrees. The theory goes, you finish smoking the wings at 400 degrees for an additional 15-20 mins.
So, I follow my hypothesis and hypothesize I’ll need maybe 15 mins, based on the current look and feel of the wings at 250 for 30 mins .
Next stop, 400 degrees Fahrenheit and a deliciously flavorful smoky wing! With crispy skin included.
Sounds great, doesn’t it?
What happens next is the stuff of legend!
“Babe. Um, is it supposed to be smoking that much…”, I hear Sergeant Shredded call out from across the living room.
(Psh, your fun. It’s a smoker, it is by definition supposed to be smoking.)
“Yeah babe, it should be fine but I’ll go out and check.”, I mutter aloud to my wife while my back is turned to the smoker inside the kitchen.
One step, two steps, three steps, and four…I’m at the sliding glass doors.
WHAT. In. The. Literal. Cluck!!
The entire smoker and porch area is engulfed in smoke !!!
“OH NO!!!”, I yell out loud.
I slide the glass door open and immediately begin coughing up a lung. I need a damn firefighting respirator to breath through this cluckin’ cloud.
I’m not panicked, just sh!ttin my pants.
I look the my left and see the temperate reading on the smoker. 475 degrees.
.
.
500 degrees.
.
515 degrees.
(This particular smoker has a maximum temperature selection is 450 
)
What in the heck is going on?
WHAT DO I DO?!?!
Well like a genius, I of course open the lid to the smoker.
Whoof.
Aghh.
*cough* *hack* *spit* *hughhggugh*
The damn smoker is on fire. Fire. FIRE!!!
I quickly shut the lid and dribble a little in my pants.
“What do I do. What do I do? WHAT DO I DO!!!” I scream out internally.
Yeah, I’m freaking the funk out now. And no, don’t you dare think to yourself,
“Just grab the fire extinguisher!”
First, how dare you. Second…I don’t have a fire extinguisher.
Yep, that’s right. I’m totally ill equipped and I’ll prepared for this situation.
I quickly gauge the temperature reading, and it’s at 550 and still rising!
*BABEeeeeee!!!!!*, I scream out to The Sergeant.
*H-E-L-P!!*
“I don’t know what to do! How do you put out a fire without a fire extinguisher!”
(Quick question, do YOU know how to put out a fire without the use of an extinguisher? Bc I sure as halibut don’t and didn’t…but I do now.)
Sergeant Shredded always quick with the reply and fast to respond, quickly finds the ONLY solution.
In a cruel twist of fate and a cruel irony as I just clearly stated above…you need Baking Powder NOT baking soda for crispy wings.
But, in a fiery smoker furnace situation where chicken wings go from crispy skin to burnt, almost melting crisp charcoal…you need
.
.
(1, 2, 3 for those in the back !)
BAKING SODA !!! Baking. Freaking. Soda. The archenemy of crispy chicken skin is the HERO of the day!
My wife slings the baking soda from across the room. Doing her best Peyton Manning impersonation, yelling out
*Omaha*
And hits me perfectly in stride.
.
.
I catch the baking soda and race towards the fiery smoker furnace, which is now billowing smoke and shooting out flames. I yank the smoker lid open and douse the ever-loving piece out of the fiery flames. Chicken wings and all!!
*Ahhhhhhh*
And with one quick baking soda dusting, the flaming furnace of smoker stupidity is extinguished.
I swiftly crank the knobs and turn the smoker off, unplugging the smoker from the wall outlet. Removing all electricity from the smoky-smoker of doomy gloominess. After a blistering, smoke-filled, scalding hot 75 minutes the flames are extinguished.
In totality there are 40 cluckin casualties of flaming war. And a melted resemblance of the internal smoker’s components remain.
And with that, The Chicken Wings Bring The Heat…on a Thursday!