Parmesan Garlic Wings

Chicken wings are a perennial favorite in our house. We order them frequently at restaurants and for takeout and also make them at home. While I still love Buffalo-style wings (as seen in my 2015 recipe), I've been experimenting with parmesan garlic wings lately. The air fry setting on our convection oven gives great, consistent results. A combination of potato and corn starch as a coating helps get the wings crispy and helps them hang onto the sauce. Of course, the wings can be deep fried instead but air frying reduces the hassle and mess.

This recipe is the culmination of several test runs over which I've made many adjustments. In the first attempt, I cooked the garlic in butter and added the cheese, which promptly fused together into a big mass. I realized what I needed was some liquid for the cheese to melt into, creating basically a thicker version of sauce Mornay (last seen on this blog as part of a croque madame). This creamy style of wings is commonly found at midwestern bars and pizza joints, like Vermillion's own Old Lumber Company, although mine might be a bit more complex. For a version omitting the cream, the wings could simply be tossed in the garlic butter and sprinkled with grated cheese before serving. 

The sauce is on the rich side, so I've made some adjustments to make the dish more balanced. Red pepper flakes add some background heat to the wings, but I don't add enough to make them overtly hot. A little lemon juice adds some much-needed acidity to a sauce that can otherwise be one note. Both of these elements can (and should) be adjusted to taste. The sauce is meant to be quite thick so it can coat the wings, but it can easily go too far into a paste-like consistency. It does thicken as it cools, so the wings are best served immediately when the sauce is ready. The parsley garnish is optional, but a little green goes a long way for the presentation.

Upgrade: Fish-Fragrant Eggplant (魚香茄子)

I first wrote about fish-fragrant eggplant (yuxiang qiezi) back in 2017. That post was already the product of quite a bit of experimentation. In the years since, the dish has remained a family favorite and we've had it many times both at home and from restaurants. In that time, I have continued to tweak the recipe. The basic structure of this new version is consistent with my previous one, but subtle changes can bring great improvements. A great lesson from the upgrades series has been that recipes aren't settled things. Make the food that you like, which is not necessarily what someone else wrote down.

The dish continues to be built around 1 1/2 lb. of Chinese eggplants. Traditionally, the eggplant is deep fried, and that's how you would get it at a Sichuanese restaurant. Eggplants absorb a lot of oil, so they have to be pressed to expel it before continuing on. Getting a pot of hot oil ready is a hassle for what amounts to a single step in the recipe, so I previously got by with stir frying the eggplant. This also takes a long time and doesn't quite achieve the right effect. Instead, I now "air fry" the eggplants to brown them and drive off moisture. This can be done unattended while you prepare the rest of the ingredients. I also do the same for dry-cooked string beans. 

The other big change is in the sauce. In my old version, it's simply too salty, so I cut the soy sauce in half. Instead, I lean into the sweet-and-sour aspect of the dish and bring up both the vinegar and sugar. The result is a more nuanced flavor which is no longer dominated by the soy sauce. I now like to add some ground meat to the dish, a familiar flavoring method seen in other Sichuan dishes like mapo doufu and the aforementioned string beans. Traditionally, only a small amount is used (1/4 lb. would probably be about right), but I like to bulk it up a bit to make this the main event in a dinner for two. In a meal for more people, I would make a separate meat dish. To make this vegetarian, the pork can certainly be omitted and the stock replaced with mushroom broth. As with my other versions of Sichuanese dishes, I split the spicy doubanjiang with Koon Chun bean sauce to take the heat down - feel free to adjust to taste.