Check out this guide and recipe on how to brine chicken wings. Great for barbecue, BBQ parties, best dry rub for beer can chicken tailgate grilling. Chicken wing brine can be as delicious as it is useful. If you’re ready to take your BBQ wings to the next level then get ready to try out this easy chicken brine recipe.
Using just a few ingredients, it couldn’t be easier to make. Here’s how to brine chicken wings. How long should you brine chicken wings for? When it comes to chicken wings, a lot of fellow BBQ enthusiasts tend to just go for a simple rub or marinade and hope for the best. Now don’t get me wrong, I love rubs and marinades, but I offer an even better solution to infusing your meat with flavor: Brining. Now, hear me out here: I know that brining intimidates a lot of people.
With its relatively long preparation time and method, it is more work. But the results are so, so good. When done right, brined meat is juicy and tender, and a brilliant way of packing in a load of flavor into even the most modestly sized of meats. A lot of people have a brine recipe that they like to refer to, but it’s also key that you apply it right, and getting those all-important measurements right is really key. So here I am to help with a quick guide to brining chicken wings, including my favorite ingredients to use, and the exact measurements you should look to use. If you want to see other meat prep guides, check out my guide on how long to brine pork shoulder. This is even more key for chicken because it’s a very lean type of meat, with very little fat content.
This makes it prone to turning from juicy to dry in mere minutes. Add to this the fact that wings tend to carry less meat than cuts like breast, and we’re asking for a lot of trouble if we don’t do the right prep. A prepared brine of water, salt, and seasoning can be mixed together and used to submerge the chicken. Salt is an excellent agent for helping meat lock in its juices and flavors. This means that once it’s cooked it will remain beautifully moist and tender.
Chicken is a lean meat, so it needs a lot longer for brining than other fattier meats, like pork. You can brine skinless chicken wings for just a few hours, but to get the real full effects I’d go much longer. I’d also suggest trying going a full 24 hours to get the absolute most out of the brine. What do you need for chicken wing brine? I almost always just go for good old fashioned water. While you might intend to make a different flavor of brine by using a different liquid, I find that water does a great job without taking much away from the flavors of the meat itself. Ensure it doesn’t contain any additives, as these can affect the purity of your mix.
Because kosher salt has no iodine content it can form clumps, which makes it ideal for brining. Avoid any container that can corrode when used. The best containers tend to be plastic or stainless steel. This helps give your meat a beautiful crisp when smoked or barbecued. For example, red pepper flakes, white pepper, black pepper. These added flavors will come down to your personal preference, but as an absolute minimum I tend to include black pepper. Follow these six simple steps and you’ll have made light work of your chicken wing brine.
The amount of liquid you’ll need will depend on the number of chicken wings you expect to cook. Too much and they’ll be soft and hard to cook, too little and they’ll dry out very easily. For the best way to measure the amount of water you need, put the wings in a large bowl. Start pouring in warm water and stop once it has submerged the meat and is sitting at about 3 inches above the top of the wings. You can then pour this water into a measuring container for you to use when needed. Quick Tip: A rough guide is to use 6 cups of water per 3 pounds of chicken wings. Measure out your saltA lot of people say that 1:16 is the best basic ratio of salt to water.
