Leftover Chicken Wings Are Ideal in Cold Noodle Bowls
About twice a month, my boyfriend and I order too many chicken wings. (We order so many that they bring them to us in a catering container. We also have fries. We won’t be ashamed.) He and I have slightly different strategies when it comes to leftover food. He eats them in his sleep, sitting in the kitchen, like a wild beast; I remove the cold meat from the bone and toss it with cold peanut noodles.
Both methods of killing leftovers have their merits, but cold chicken wings are great for making cold noodles. Rather than trying to bring them back to their former glory freshly flavored with heat, adding them to a bowl of cold noodles is an act that accepts – no, celebrates – the fact that they’re cold.
A good bowl of noodles should be a very loud, almost husky symphony of flavors, and chicken wings are pretty noisy for that matter. Chicken wings, which are usually cooked twice, are made up of a ton of broken down connective tissue and fat – two things that determine the taste . They are already cooked and seasoned with sauce, and the meat is separated from the bones in perfect little shreds – you just peel them off with your fingers! Toss this meat with cold noodles (I often use instant ramen), whatever vegetables you have, and some sort of sauce for a complete meal that is hardly cooked (noodles have to be cooked).
I usually use AA Newton Hot Peanut Sauce or this ginger dressing for sauces , but I recommend picking a sauce that contrasts slightly with the way your wings were tucked in. If your wings are very spicy, choose something creamy and chilling. If you have sticky sweet wings, choose something spicy and sour. If you have classic buffalo wings, choose something based on peanuts. (I don’t know why this combination is so good, it just is.) Fry the noodles separately, then garnish with grated winged meat. Repeat until you are finished with the wings.