Wellington Hot Wings Olympics

You’re looking at the best spicy chicken wings in Wellington!

This story starts with me justifying why I ate spicy wings at 21 Wellington bars, cafes and food trucks. It ends with you eating the crispiest, juiciest, tastiest spicy wings in town.

Want to skip the story? Here’s the gold, silver and bronze medalists.

“Aren’t food reviews the usual Wellington stuff?”

Yep. But this is not a usual food review.

I wasn’t going to do food-related stories. There’s plenty of good coverage of the Wellington foodie scene.

Check foodiegemsofwellie for local reviews. Go to Hungry & Frozen for recipes to match your Wellington moods. Listen to Honeycombe if you love a podcast. Read Beth Brash and Alice Lloyd’s 2018 book, THE CUBA STREET PROJECT: Place, Food, People.

“Best of lists. Isn’t that the usual Wellington stuff?”

I wasn’t going to do ‘best of’ lists either. When I read a ‘Top 5’ list which doesn’t state the judging criteria upfront, I feel like maybe I’m actually reading “The 5 we got some nice photos of” or “The 5 who purchased ads on our website”.

I’s easy to be cynical and it’s easy to be a critic. What’s hard is doing it better. So here I am, writing a Top 3 the way I’d like to see it done.

Why Wings?

Right now, Wellington is a burger town. Just check out the #BurgerWelly hashtag.

When I want a burger, you’ll find me at Burger Liquor, every time. But a website which boasts “Not the usual Wellington stuff” has got to zig while everyone’s zagging, right? So wings it is! Oh, and I’m addicted to Hot Ones on Youtube.

There’s different preparation and cooking methods for spicy wings. Some are slow-cooked, some are baked, some are fried. Some are tossed in a sauce, some come with the sauce on the side. Others are dusted with spice. Regardless of how they end up on my plate, what I want is crunch on the outside, succulent meat on the inside, and the level of spiciness promised on the menu.

For me, there’s good heat and bad heat. Bad heat means I’m not enjoying the food. I want to be challenged but I don’t want to be distressed. When the spice is just right, my left eye sheds a single tear. True story!

In case you’re wondering, the wings I tried fall into the loose category of ‘American style’. Korean wings are a whole other thing and worthy of their own Top 3.

Starting to wish you skipped straight to the medal winners? That’s cool. Click here.

The Methodology

Here’s the 21 wing joints judged, in the order I visited them:

If you only counted 18 on the list, that’s because there was drama! One judging session was abandoned. The wings were that bad. One venue was disqualified for controversial business practices. One business has now permanently closed.

The scoring system I used is weighted towards the wings but the dining experience forms part of the final score. Here’s what I was judging:

If you really want to geek out, here’s the official scoring sheet. Kudos to The Great Chicken Wing Hunt whose own scoring system inspired mine.

Spicy wings often come with accompaniments; ranch or blue cheese sauce, celery, sometimes carrot. These weren’t part of the judging.

I was sober for every scoring session. I always judged appearance and aroma before taking a bite. I always ate 3 wings before judging taste and spiciness.

I wanted to be able to score the wings discretely so that I didn’t attract any attention from the venue. I developed an eating technique of keeping one hand clean so I could enter scores into a spreadsheet on my phone. No photographs were taken during scoring sessions.

When all 21 had been judged, I returned to the 3 highest scoring wing joints to judge them again. Could they consistently deliver an amazing wing experience?

FULL DISCLOSURE: After being an anonymous, full-paying customer twice, when scoring was complete, I contacted the top 3 venues, explained what I was doing and asked if I could return to take some official photographs of their wings. I also gave them the option of providing those wings for free. 2 of them did.

OK. Ready for the reveal? Follow the wings!

Wellington Hot Wings Olympics: The Medalists

GOLD MEDAL: The Pickle Jar

Behold! Wellington’s gold medal winning wings!

The Pickle Jar’s wings look spectacular, smell sublime and have the perfect amount of sauce.

There’s 2 spicy options: Hot Buffalo, and the addition of a shot of Carolina Reaper hot sauce. On both my visits I chose and judged the Hot Buffalo option with the Carolina Reaper shot on the side. The spiciness of Buffalo Hot is at the high end of medium but having the Carolina Reaper on the side allows you to take it up a level.

The Pickle Jar serves their wings by the pound for $17. On my first visit, that amounted to 17 wings. On my second visit; 14. That’s an average of $1.10 per wing which makes them the third cheapest I tried.

Eating wings is fun, but messy. To help you out, the Pickle Jar serves their wings with a finger bowl. Fancy!

The Pickle Jar is a neighbourhood pub with a fun atmosphere. They cater for a good cross-section of the Karori community and their service is friendly and professional.

Their wings are free range, gluten-free and available 7 days a week.

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SILVER MEDAL: The Rogue & Vagabond

Deliciously, I could smell spicy wings as soon as I set foot inside The Rogue & Vagabond for my first tasting. Their wings are well-cooked and very tasty.

There’s 2 spicy options: Smokey Chipotle (Hot) and Dragon’s Fury (Extra Hot). Dragon’s Fury hot sauce is NZ-made and has won multiple international awards in the ‘ultra hot’ category. I judged the Smokey Chipotle, which I would rate as medium-hot, but also tried the Dragon’s Fury which was over-the-top hot.

At 77 cents each, Rogue’s wings are the best value for money in town but they’re only available on Wednesdays. The photo above shows the $19 deal featuring 5x Smokey Chipotle, 2x Dragon’s Fury and 5x mild BBQ plus a pint of whatever tickles your fancy on tap.

The Rogue & Vagabond are an accredited living wage employer and their wings are free range. That combo probably makes them the most ethical wing joint in Wellington.

You can enjoy Rogue’s wings in one of the best atmospheres of all the venues I visited. Laze on the lawn or soak up their ecclectic interior. Stick around for live music most nights. You can bring your dog too!

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BRONZE MEDAL: Tequila Joe’s

Tequila Joe’s wings are wonderfully juicy and the spice is just right.

There’s 4 types of spiciness on offer: Buffalo Classic (Medium), Spicy Sriracha (Hot), Garlic Fire (Hot) and Damn Hot (Extra Hot). I chose Damn Hot and found it to be perfect. I shed a single tear.

Tequilla Joe’s wings are available Tuesday to Saturday. The menu states 6 wings for $15 but I got a surprise 7th wing on both tasting occasions. Wednesday is all-you-can-eat wing night at $24 for orders before 5:30, $29 after 5:30pm

Tequila Joe’s has a buzzy vibe. It’s small so it fills up quickly but I always felt the service kept up with the crowd. I was lucky to get a stool at the end of the bar, both times I visited. Book in advance if there’s more than 2 of you.

Apart from great wings, Tequila Joe’s specialise in Mexican beers, cocktails and tequilas.

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HONOURABLE MENTIONS

Shout-outs to The Green Man Pub, The Butcher and Brewer in Petone and Soul Shack. They all scored well and deserve a mention.

The Green Man Pub does tender, tasty wings and has 3 serving sizes depending on your appetite: ¼kg, ½kg & 1kg. A heads-up for hipsters, Green Man’s sauces are the kind of buttery that sticks around in a beard. They do have the best-named extra-hot option; Total Molecular Disintegration!

The Butcher and Brewer‘s wings win on texture and flavour. They’re coated in a secret recipe dry rub for 24 hours. Next, they’re slow-smoked for another three and a half. When you order them, the wings are crispy-fried and tossed in The Butcher and Brewer’s own-recipe hot sauce.

Soul Shack‘s Nashville wings are among the crispiest and juiciest in town. They offer 4 levels of spice. If you want the indisputably hottest, spiciest, meanest and most unforgiving wings in Wellington, go see Soul Shack. Their Level 4: Nightmare Chicken is pure evil. It will punish you. It will hurt you bad. It will mock your tears and laugh in your purple, dribbling face. Nightmare Chicken will haunt you forever. Write a will and enjoy responsibly.

There’s still spicy wings around town I haven’t tried. Did I miss your favourites or do you disagree with mine? Let me know, below.