Pupusa and Hot Wings

Lupe had to go to LA last week to get some paperwork for her passport. After dealing with the cubicle drones at the State hive in downtown LA, Lupe and I went for a little lunch. We wandered around the Grand Central Market looking for grub. I quickly spotted a pupuseria that I recognized from Food TV's show; "The Best Thing I Ever Ate." Mary Sue Milliken had recommended the pupusas from Sarita's Pupuseria. We ordered a sampler assortment of pupusas; chicharron, carne asada and pollo asada. I must say they were very tasty. I've only had pupusas once before, so I don't have much to compare them to. Lupe used to get them frequently back in Long Beach. There were a lot of Salvadorans at the company we worked for and they always wanted pupusas for lunch. Lupe thought that Sarita's pupusas compared very favorably to others she has tried.

From The Hollow Leg Diner - images

All during the Stanley Cup finals I felt like I was missing something. I hadn't been doing much cooking during that time so there was no memorable food to go along with the great hockey action. I think I ate a salami sandwich the night of game 6. That was not worthy of the great hockey that was on TV. What I really needed was a good deep dish pizza or a Philly cheese-steak sandwich. A few days later I was mulling over ideas for good hockey-watching food and I decided that I needed to make some Buffalo wings. I have fond memories of sitting at Seau's, eating hot wings and watching Colorado skate the cup. My mind was made up.....Buffalo wings. After separating the wings I dusted them with Cayenne pepper, smoked paprika, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper. I drizzled a little chicken fat over the wings and then tossed the wings. Once the wings were completely coated I covered them and let them sit in the fridge for a couple hours. In the interim I made both bleu cheese and ranch dips. I cut a bunch of carrot, celery and jicama sticks to go with the wings. I also prepped some asparagus to go with the wings. The wings went onto a broiler rack and into a 375 degree oven. I flipped the wings a couple of times during the hour they spent in the oven. As the wings cooked I gave the asparagus a quick sauté. After I got a little color on the asparagus I deglazed the pan with some sherry. I added some beef stock to finish cooking the asparagus. When the wings were done I took them out and tossed them with some Frank's hot wing sauce. After turning off the oven, I put the wings back in to help set the sauce. This gives a nice finish and makes the wings a little less messy. This was definitely a finger food dinner. Lots of napkins on standby as we dug in. The wings were great and slightly healthier than if they had been fried. Aw hell.....who cares. They were just good. I would have fried them if I had enough oil. Either way, hot wings are always good. Like pizza, they aren't something you'd want to eat every day, but they are good occasionally.

From The Hollow Leg Diner - images