in the kitchensmoke then fry

Cooking the wing through in smoke, then dropping it briefly into hot oil or onto high heat to tighten the skin. Smoke gives flavour and colour that a fryer cannot; the fryer gives a crust that smoke alone leaves flabby. The rub or the sauce goes on after.

The temperatures explain the problem. Hot smoking runs at 52–80 °C / 126–176 °F, which cooks food while flavouring it but is far below the 177–191 °C a crust needs; smoke roasting, above 121 °C / 250 °F, combines roasting and smoking and still leaves poultry skin soft. Above 85 °C / 185 °F foods can shrink, buckle or split, so a smoker cannot simply be turned up. Hickory, oak, pecan, apple and mesquite are the common North American woods; different tree species have different ratios of components and so give different flavours.

Buffalo's own reference text records the alternatives without endorsing them: traditionally the wings are deep-fried, but alternatively they may be baked, grilled, or broiled.

Tradition holds — barbecue houses that sell wings usually smoke first and finish in the fryer, and describe the finish in seconds rather than minutes. This project has not found a published house method that states a time.

Inference — the technique is a barbecue kitchen borrowing a bar's last step, which is why it shows up on menus where the pit is the main business and the wing is the appetiser.

Dry the wings, rub if the house rubs. Smoke at a hot-smoking temperature until cooked through, taking colour from the wood. Rest and dry the surface. Drop into hot oil for a short finish, or onto direct high heat, only long enough to set the skin. Sauce or dust after; a sauce applied before the fryer burns, and a rub applied before the smoke can turn bitter over a long cook.

Standard at barbecue counters that sell wings, and increasingly at bars with a smoker out back. Inference — it is also a scheduling method: the smoke happens in the morning and the fryer happens to order, so a slow cook reaches a bar's service speed.