in the kitchenthe toss

The metal bowl. Cooked wings go into a bowl or pot, sauce goes over them, and the whole thing is shaken to coat the wings completely before serving. It is the last step of a Buffalo wing and the only one that touches the wing after the oil.

The step is in the earliest account. The Anchor Bar's own telling has Teressa Bellissimo deep-frying the wings and then flavouring them with a mixture of butter, cayenne pepper and other ingredients; the bar states the rule as plainly as it can be stated — the sauce is added after the wing has been cooked.

How much butter is in the bowl is how heat is set. Cayenne pepper sauce, melted butter and vinegar are the standard base, made mild, medium or hot, sometimes with Worcestershire sauce and garlic powder; more butter reads mild, less reads hot, and a bar's mild and its hot come out of the same two bottles.

Korean shops refuse the bowl. Bonchon brushes sauce on by hand rather than tossing in containers, to spread the seasoning evenly without compromising the texture of a double-fried shell.

Inference — the bowl is a texture decision disguised as a saucing decision. Tossing puts sauce everywhere and softens everything; brushing puts sauce on top and keeps the crust. Every regional style is somewhere on that line, and most of them are arguing about where.

Hold the sauce warm, not hot — butter splits if it boils. Tip the drained wings into a stainless bowl, pour the sauce over, and shake with the wrist rather than stirring with a spoon; a spoon tears skin and leaves bald patches. Empty the bowl straight onto the plate and let the residue go with it. A dry-rub order gets the same bowl and a dust instead of a liquid.

Standard in every Buffalo house and in the chains that copied them. Tradition holds — the sound of the bowl is a house's signature and the order in which a bar tosses — hottest last, so the bowl does not carry heat into the next order — is an unwritten rule most kitchens keep.