Why does Buffalo do it best?

            Everyone had the good, the bad and the ugly when it comes to chicken wings, but how can people butcher the simplest of wings: the Buffalo wing?

            Every big city has something they are known for: Chicago and the deep dish pizza, Philadelphia and the cheese steak sub and Buffalo with the chicken wings. At some point, shouldn’t other cities be able to at least emulate what the originator has created and take that from them?

Just like any food, you must thoroughly know the recipe and understand what does and does not work. Buffalonians know that the Buffalo wing has one distinct flavor and would tell you if you’re doing it right or wrong.

            Jeff Feather is owner of the original Duff’s Famous Wings in Amherst and has high prominence in the Buffalo-region for making a great Buffalo wing. Feather talked about how he feels his wings compare to others in Buffalo.

“Of course, I think my wings are the best,” Feather said, “but there are so many places in Buffalo that make good wings. Not so much outside of Buffalo.”

            The original formula is basic. It is Frank’s RedHot sauce and butter. Seems simple enough, but places don’t stick to what they know.

            Food critic and writer for the Buffalo News, Andrew Galarneau, believes that Buffalo isn’t the only place that knows how to make a good wing, and he backs it up.

            “I don’t believe in the ‘only Buffalo has good wings,’ Galarneau said. “There are places that studied up on it and do it right. You could make good wings anywhere, but the reason why good wings may not be everywhere is because they don’t know the basics.”

            Buffalo makes great chicken wings. The standard for a good chicken wing is different here than for other cities. It is not just every wing joint, but it is common that even our pizzerias have a great wing to add to their selection.

            “Western New York has a lot of places that the default is still a good chicken wing and other places with great wings,” Galarneau said.

            Donnie Burtless and Alison Suriani are co-founders of Buffalo Eats, a blog on Buffalo foods. Burtless said that he doesn’t eat chicken wings when he travels. “Why would I, if we could get really good wings back here?”

            “I think Buffalo has the best consistency over any other city,” Burless said. “We don’t bread them. Everyone knows how long it takes to properly fry them. So I think the standard here is so much higher than everywhere else. I think we are probably the best ones in the country.”

A good chicken wing all starts with what you’re working with. They have to have substantial meat, good amount of sauce per wing and as Christa Glennie Seychew the senior editor of the Buffalo Spree said, it needs “amazing blue cheese dressing – which we don’t have enough of in this area” on the side for every great Buffalo wing.

            People love Buffalo wings; why else would it be so big in this country? Still new restaurants are trying different things to get a good tasting wing. Some wings work out, but a lot fail to successfully touch the taste buds correctly.

            “I’m sure there are remarkable restaurants that have reinvented the chicken wing than more else in the world,” Seychew said. “But since we invented them here, we are the only place that makes them properly. Although not even all of our locations served in Buffalo are made properly. Elsewhere in the country you will find that people, when they order ‘Buffalo wings,’ which no Buffalonian would ever call them Buffalo wings.

“When they order Buffalo wings, often times they are breaded, they are made with margarine and Tabasco instead of butter and RedHot, or they’re served with ranch dressing. And those sorts of things are considered totally inappropriate to a real chicken wing eater.”

It is faux pas in the wing world to sway from what has been working for so long. Some retailers start with the wrong product and it goes downhill from there.

“Because they use precooked or cheap wings to begin with,” Seychew believed was the reasoning behind the terrible wings in other places. “Cause the face product, of course, has to be excellent and no body bought chicken wings before Buffalo made them famous. What has happened is that lots of people make different kinds of wings for retail sale to restaurants.

“There are wings that are precooked or partially cooked, there are wings that are pre-dipped in sauce that people just have to microwave, and there are horrible shortcuts to wings. The only way to make really good wings is to make them the way you’re supposed to, originally. Nobody wants to do that because it takes a long time, it’s more expensive, but the truth is places that make wings [the long] way are the places we talk about as being the best places in town to go for wings.”

Whether you call Buffalonians traditionalists or not, we stick to the formula the wing was founded on. To know how to make a good Buffalo chicken wing, you have to know the basics before it hits the bar.

Football and Wings

             In the world of chicken wings, nothing goes better with a nice bucket of wings than sports. The John Murphy Show was hosted at Duff’s Famous Wings on Niagara Falls Boulevard, and had some prominent former Buffalo Bills’ players liven up the event for all spectators who experienced it.

             Duff’s was packed at the beginning of the show with sports fans and chicken wing lovers alike. It was a tightly packed house, as the line for seating was about a 15-minute wait. Everyone’s eyes were attracted to the table -- where the radio show was being conducted. The show also included some fan interaction like questions about the Bills and the fans input for the upcoming season.

“Pretty big,” Tawny Sacilowski, manager of that Duff’s location, said when asked how this event is for Duff’s. “We are sponsors. We are part of the Bills Corporation. So we get to host events like this.”

            Both Steve Tasker and the voice of the Bills John Murphy reflected on this event and what it means to their fans of Buffalo.

“Well yeah. It beats a sharp stick to the eye,” Tasker jokingly said about the event. “Sometimes I wish it was more comfortable for people. Duff’s here is nice. Everybody has a place to sit; there’s no line or anything like that.

“And usually if it’s an autograph signing or anything like that, I can find everybody who wants my autograph in under 30 minutes and that’s about all there ever is. So it’s good for me.”

Murphy added that this is the third or fourth event they have done at a Duff’s in Western New York.

“Yeah, it’s fun,” Murphy said. “They are always great. It’s bar food and people come here with sports on their mind. It’s a perfect venue for us, you know? And most of these people are Bills’ fans. There’s something about the intersection of wings, beer and sports that kind of puts people in a good mood.”

With the Buffalo Bills’ offseason being the focal point of the show, questions surfaced about the relationship between football and chicken wings.

“It is like hotdogs and baseball, I guess,” Tasker said. “That’s the way it is. I think it is the new hotdogs to baseball with wings to football.”

Murphy believes the combo is so successful because of the extensive advertising of wings during the football season.

“I mean, I don’t have any stats to back this up but I would guess that it is one of the most popular tailgate food,” Murphy said. “Stuff that people eat at football games are chicken wings. You [have] seen the TV ads during the Super Bowl. It is all chicken wings. They built whole campaigns around it. Pushing wings to football audiences. It’s kind of a natural fit.”

Buffalo is known for wings, but how important was chicken wings to Buffalo and its history?

“I think it is a sense of identity [to Buffalo],” Murphy said. “I mean I am older enough to remember when wings first came on to the scene, I want to say in the mid-70s, when places started offering them. I was an 18- to 20-year-old and suddenly there is this incredible bar food that went really well with beer. And it is an international phenomenon.”

Tasker believed in the opposition; Chicken wings do not make up a significant part of Buffalo.

“Buffalo would be fine without it,” Tasker said. “It’s a cool thing, don’t get me wrong, but we would be fine. Buffalo is Buffalo, not because of the wings, but because of the people. It would be worse if Buffalo’s people weren’t the same.”

Both Tasker and Murphy had different taste buds on what’s their favorite wings.

“I like basic wings that they have here,” Murphy said. “I like barbeque, a little bit, but I don’t like things too crazy. I like basic, medium to medium-hot wings.”

Tasker had a specific place in mind that he wanted to share that sells “the best wing.”

“Bar Bill [Tavern] in East Aurora,” Tasker confessed. “I hate to say it in Duff’s, but it’s the medium wings in Bar Bill.”

             The John Murphy Show at Duff’s combined two aspects that Buffalonians love: good food and sports. The event created an amusing atmosphere and was full of curious fans. Buffalo wings and Buffalo sports, what more can you ask?

Duff's Famous Wings

No food in Buffalo is bigger than the Buffalo wings; the people of Buffalo just call them wings. Who better than Jeff Feather, owner of Duff’s Famous Wings, to talk to about wings.

Duff’s Famous Wings has been a staple in the history of chicken wings. 

“[There is] a lot of history here,” Feather said. “It was built in 1946. It’s a small, little place. When it was originally built it was on a dirt road.”

Just by the look of the Duff’s Wings on Sheridan Drive in Amherst, you feel the tradition. Old style white wall with a red roof and wood pillars coming through the front wall. Inside the restaurant, it had the feel as if you were there opening day. The story to Duff’s is unique to say the least. 

“[Tradition at Duff’s is] simply just wings,” Feather said. “Anchor bar put them in in 1965 and they started getting big and my partner Ron Duff loved them. He loved eating wings. There was a place across the street called La Hacienda. [Duff] would order them for himself every day. 

“They were closing down and they were friends of his and they said look it, we will teach you how to do them and why don’t you put them on your menu. So, he said, okay great and he put them on the menu. He didn’t sell many at first, but he enjoyed them. People started coming and we got known in this part of town for wings because not every bar had them back then.”

In 2009, the Travel Channel started a new show called Food Wars. Food Wars went to the best food cities and chose two restaurants that made that food famous in the city and had them compete against each other to see who makes it best. Their first episode was the rivalry of wings with Anchor Bar, the originator of the chicken wing, versus Duff’s wings. The show had foodies from Buffalo and a Buffalo sports great, Rob Ray. The contest ended with Duff’s wings beating the Anchor Bar’s wings by the vote of three to two.

“It was exciting [to be on Food Wars],” Feather said. “And poor Ivano [Toscani] from the Anchor Bar had to relive it five times because they had to take cuts from it. ‘Okay, let’s do it again, let’s do it again.’ But he was a great sport about it and everything.”

Feather is a family man; he has a wife and three kids. Being an owner, he is a very busy man and his business is the second part of him.

“He is a pretty basic, humble, family man,” said Ed Conley, general manager and worker at Duff’s Famous Wings for 25 years. “He is a church goer. He loves playing golf. That’s his thing.”

Even Feather himself argues that he is “just an ordinary guy.” There is nothing ordinary about a guy who helps run a franchise that attracted the president of the United States went to. Yes, Barack Obama went to Buffalo to go to a Duff’s store the same year they won the Food Wars competition.

Feather is not only an owner; he is a buffalonian. Feather went to University at Buffalo and Canisius for graduate school and Feather is happy to build on Buffalo’s “featured food.” 

“Of course, I think my wings are the best,” Feather said, “but there are so many places in Buffalo that make good wings. Not so much outside of Buffalo. It’s great for the city of Buffalo.”

The definition to Duff’s Famous Wings was simple to Conley as he said in a quick reply, “the best wings.” Chicken wing fanatics find that tough to argue with.