Korean Redneck Wings

I recently tried a recipe from Zen Kimchi's Food Journal for Baba Ghanoush. I too overdid the garlic since I was using pre-chopped garlic and did not know exactly how much to add. Evidently, 2 cloves makes a lot less than I thought it did. That said, it was quite tasty and goes well spread on a fresh baguette and a glass of white zinfandel. And being the reciprocal sort of fellow that I am, I decided to post another fusion recipe that I took a while to come up with and have been using to satisfy folks from both sides of the big pond. I call them Korean Redneck Wings.

• 1 kg chicken wings/drummettes (I like to use the drummettes (봉))


• 1/2 cup soy sauce (I find 오복 works best)


• 1/2 cup honey


• 1/4 cup molasses (difficult item to find in Korea, probably only on a US military base)


• 2 tablespoons Tabasco sauce (McIlhenny is my brand)


• 2 tablespoons Korean red pepper paste (고추장)


• 2-3 tablespoons Korean red pepper powder (고추가루)


• 2 teaspoons ground ginger (Fresh is best but powder is OK too)


• 3 or 4 cloves of garlic


• sesame seeds (garnish)

1. In a large bowl mix soy sauce, honey, molasses, Tabasco sauce, red pepper paste and powder, ginger and garlic.


2. Add chicken to the bowl and mix well, making sure to saturate all of the drummettes.


3. Cover and place in the refrigerator for approximately 1 hour.


4. Heat oven to 180C


5. Place drummettes on an ungreased cookie sheet (I have also used a casserole dish successfully but the wings tend to come out a little too runny)


6. Cook for 50 minutes. At 10 and 20 minutes brush with remaining sauce. At 25 minutes, turn them over. At 30 and 40 minutes, brush with more sauce.


7. Garnish with sesame seeds

This is what was left after my wife got done with the rest of the kilo of chicken.

You would think that with all the Tabasco, red pepper and garlic that these would come out really spicy but they don't (from the perspective of the Korean palate!). Even if you increase the red pepper and garlic as mentioned. If you want fire wings in the same vein, you would need to find the fire pepper (ask for 땡초가루 at the store or market) and use that instead of the regular kind. That should melt your epiglottis nicely. I know the molasses is a bit of a task to find if you don't have a contact at the nearest base. If you find a place to buy it on the economy, please drop me a comment; I'm all out and my wife is begging me for more wings.

These are great with cold beer (as if there were any doubt). If you have friends over, make sure you double or triple up on the recipe. I made 2 kilos worth for my family (6 adults and 3 and 1/2 children) and they disappeared in about an hour along with 6 pitcher bottles of Cass.

Other variations include using leftover sauce to cook chicken strips (less oven time) to put on a nice green salad and using the same sauce for full-sized drumsticks (needs more oven time). I even used the same sauce for making squid side dishes (오징어구이안주) which met with approval from young and old.


Enjoy and be sure to drop me a comment if you give it a try and let me know how it turned out.