Sous vide, air fried sriracha wings.

This was something I made for the Super Bowl this year.  Two days before the big game the chicken wings were cut into drumettes and wingettes with the wing tips saved for future stock making.  They were dusted with the hot chicken spice mix from this post, vacuum sealed and cooked in a water bath fitted with my Nomiku and set to 64°C for about 5 hours, my Anova was nearby as a backup if needed.  After removing the wings from the bath they were allowed to rest for about 15 minutes before being stashed in the fridge until the next day.  I Removed the wings from the bag to a paper towel lined sheet pan and patted them dry as much as possible, they were them sprinkled with a 1/2 and 1/2 mixture of pink Himalayan sea salt and baking powder and put in the refrigerator overnight to dry.  This is a technique I saw in a Serious Eats recipe for oven-fried Buffalo wings which I figured  would work as well in the air frier as it does in a conventional oven.  To finish the wings I set my Avalon Bay Air Fryer to 400°F and let it warm up for a few minutes.  The wings were tossed in olive oil until well coated and placed in the fryer basket with as much space between them as I could muster, then the basket was inserted in to the air fryer.  After 5 minutes I shook the wings and returned them to the fryer for another 4-5 minutes.  At the end of that time the skin was nice and crispy and the wings completely warmed through.  The sauce was equal parts sriracha sauce and sweet Thai chili sauce (I usually use Mae Ploy brand but couldn't find it at the supermarket that day so I used another brand) and a touch of soy glaze.  They were served with blue cheese dressing for dipping.

I was pretty happy with these wings, cooking them sous vide resulted in an extremely moist and tasty wing.  The air frying worked ok, but I think finishing them by deep frying in very hot oil would have produced a more crunchy skin.  Since the wings are already cooked in the water bath you don't have to worry about cooking them through in the oil and can go for a short fry in hotter oil.  I'll have to try that next time with and without the baking powder to see how it changes things.