I can’t get enough of watching YouTube cooking channels lately. I really love that I can search any food I’m interested in and find great recipes and really videos showcasing the recipes. I am such a visual learner, so watching someone make a video of how to make a particular dish or dessert is SO helpful to me. My favorite part of watching these types of videos has got to be when the person is done making the food and they enthusiastically take a bite of the finished product.

My favorite recently was watching a video of a guy making lemon pepper wings as a Wingstop copycat. I have only talked about those dang lemon pepper chicken wings on here about a million times, but I’m telling you--they are worthy of being talked about incessantly! What’s not so great about them though is the price :( They are definitely pricey and my husband and I only indulge in them every once in a great while because of this. The great news is--if you learn how to make crispy chicken wings at home, you can totally achieve the same product for a FRACTION of the price!

Here are some tips I learned from mashed.com for making the crispiest, most delicious homemade chicken wings. Following these tips can bring you so much joy and happiness by having one of the most delicious, flavorful, crunchy and truly unique foods that have ever been known to man! Yes, I’m being this overly dramatic about chicken wings. For some reason, I am very passionate about this topic. Everyone deserves to have amazing crispy chicken wings in their life for an affordable price, amirite?

1. Double Fry Your Wings

The secret to getting your wings to have that signature irresistible crunch you love is not just to fry them, but double fry them. First fry your wings at a relatively low temperature (around 250 degrees), and then let them cool. That will make your wings tender and moist on the inside. Then raise the temperature of the oil to 400 degrees and throw in the cooked, cooled wings for a few more minutes to finish them. This will give your wings the maximum crispiness--filled with the little air bubbles that are so satisfying to bite into.

2. Don’t Bread Them

You might feel the need to bread them like you would normal fried chicken, but don’t! Chicken wings have their own unique skin and particular type of crispiness that is only achieved by just frying the straight up chicken. This can especially be achieved correctly by following the double-frying step above. Try to ignore that itch to bread your chicken and you won’t be sorry.

3. Don’t Sauce Your Wings Too Early

The sauce should go on the wings at the absolute last moment possible. You want them to be tossed in the bowl of sauce only right before you are about to eat them so they don’t get soggy. No matter how good the flavor of the wings and sauce are, the texture is really what we are eating them for, right? It is a sad, SAD day when we order our favorite buffalo wings at Wingstop and they are soggy. It’s also hard to pay $40 for soggy wings! :/

4. Go Big with Dipping Sauces

One little tip I liked that I had never thought of before was providing your guest with another little ramekin filled with extra sauce to drizzle or dip their wings in. Of course you have your little side cup of ranch or blue cheese dressing, but you can also provide some extra sauce like buffalo or Asian zing or whatever sauce you made to give the option of extra saucy wings.

Do you have any other tips you’d add to making the best chicken wings possible at home? Do you dip in ranch or bleu cheese? Please share your thoughts in the comments below.