Wing Country

a wordwing tip

also: tip · wingtip · third segment

wing tipwing + tip, a plain compound; the piece also answers to flapper and to pointer, and all three names describe the same shape from a different angle

Third segment, the pointed end. Skin, cartilage, two slivers of bone, almost no meat. Usually cut off before the wing reaches a fryer and boiled into stock instead, though some restaurants serve it still joined to the flat.

Root. wing + tip, a plain compound; the piece also answers to flapper and to pointer, and all three names describe the same shape from a different angle
Wikipedia's Buffalo wing article names the three segments "drumette, flat, and flapper or pointer"; its poultry article gives "the wing tip (also called the 'flapper')". Inference — tip is what a butcher calls it, flapper what a cook calls it, pointer what a diner calls it when handed one. Cited · wp-buffalo-wing

How it is done Tradition

Where it survives on the plate, it is eaten whole — crust, cartilage and all — or left in the bone bowl. Where it does not, it goes into a stockpot: collagen from the joints is what makes chicken stock set, so the least saleable piece of the wing is the one worth most to a kitchen that makes its own.

The particulars

part of speechnoun
regionThe United States
confidencehigh · updated 2026-09-16

Who it runs with

wordsflapperThe same piece under the name a kitchen uses for it.and of this page it says: The same piece under the butcher's name, and the one a label prints.wordswingThe third of its three segments, and the one a menu usually leaves out of the count.and of this page it says: The pointed end, usually cut off and boiled for stock.wordsflatWhat it is attached to, and what it gets cut away from.and of this page it says: Attached to this piece until somebody cuts it off; a few kitchens leave it on.the kitchenthe wing cutThe cut that removes it, the first of the two.and of this page it says: The third piece, usually cut off and boiled for stock rather than sold.wordsparty wingA pack defined partly by this piece's absence.and of this page it says: Removed at the plant, which is the whole point of the product.

Who talks about it

words · on this pagedrumetteCut from the far end of the same wing, and usually not sold.stories · on this pageThe flat and the drumThe third segment, cut off and boiled, which is why a wing sells as two pieces and not three.

Where we got it

Where it came from: Cited a source we name · Harvested pulled from an open dataset · Tradition what the tradition says, hedged · Inference this project's reasoning · Field somebody stood there. This record as JSON.

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