The Perfect Crock Pot Chicken Wings

My husband LOVES chicken wings. He is always experimenting with a new chicken wings recipe and a new way of cooking them. He loves to cook chicken wings every which way- fried, baked, grilled, and in the crock pot. Most recently he has settled into a crock pot chicken wings routine because we like how it renders off so much of the fat and leaves the meat so tender, juicy, and easy to get off the bone. After we cook the chicken wings in the crock pot (aka slow cooker), we crisp them up in the oven for just a few minutes and they come out so perfect! You will love these crispy crockpot chicken wings for a super bowl party or just for any day of the week.

When Carrot Krate, a local community supported agriculture CSA delivery service, asked me if I could come up with a chicken wings recipe featuring some local farms, I knew my husband was up for the challenge. We love supporting local small businesses. I unboxed my Carrot Krate which featured free- range chicken wings from Katharos Farm, Nashville Heat hot sauces, Williams Raw Honey, and Sriracha, Shallot, & Scallion Butter from The Chattanooga Butter Company.

With these tasty ingredients for inspiration, it was super easy to come up with a crock pot chicken wings recipe. Here’s how to cook crockpot chicken wings and three different chicken wings sauces to use on crock pot hot wings from mild to spicy.

Crispy Crock Pot Chicken Wings Recipe

4 servings, about 4-5 for each person (so a great appetizer or dinner if served with lots of sides)

Crock Pot Chicken Wings Ingredients:
2 pounds of Katharos Farm free range chicken wings
2 tsp of Simply Organic Grilling Seasons Chicken seasoning (or 1/2 tsp of garlic powder, 1/2 tsp sea salt, 1/4 tsp ground black pepper, 1/4 tsp sage, 1/4 tsp rosemary, 1/4 tsp thyme)

Chicken Wings Sauce Ingredients:
We made three different spicy buffalo wing sauces. If you just one to go with one, you will want to triple the recipe.  You can use these three Nashville Heat hot sauces or substitute your favorite hot sauces or even use BBQ sauce.  My sister’s favorite is Frank’s RedHot Sauce but you can pick whatever suits your taste. We like Crystal hot sauce too!

Garlic Habanero-
2 tbsp Nashville Heat garlic habanero hot sauce
2 tsp butter, melted

Smoked Chipotle-
2 tbsp Nashville Heat sweet smoked chipotle
2 tsp butter, melted

Honey Sriracha-
1.5 tbsp The Chattanooga Butter Company Sriracha, Shallot, & Scallion Butter, melted
2 tbsp Williams Raw Honey
1 tbsp Nashville Heat habanero (OPTIONAL and only if you love heat, otherwise this is most mild of the hot wings sauces but it still has a little kick from the Sriracha butter. It was perfect for our kids who don’t like too much heat and I couldn’t resist the sweet and spicy combo either.)

How To Cook Hot Wings In A Crock Pot:

This crock pot chicken wings recipe is so easy! You will hardly believe how easy it is but the hot wings in crock pot taste fantastic without much fuss.

The first step is to take your wings and cut them up into the 3 pieces- the drumette, the flat, and the tip. We don’t use the wing tips in this hot wings recipe but you can save those for your slow cooker chicken stock recipe.

Next up, just toss the wings with the herbs and spices and dump them in the slow cooker and set it on low for 4 hours.  Or you can cook for 2 hours on high. Just depends on when you want them to be ready!  If you are using frozen chicken wings it will be 3 hours on high.  

When you pull the lid off a few hours later, you will find that the fat has largely cooked right off the wings.

Mix up your simple wing hot sauces.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Line a baking pan with aluminum foil to avoid a mess and you can also use it to create dividers between your slow cooker chicken wings so you can keep the sauced wings separate.

Use tongs to lay the crock pot wings out onto the baking sheet with space between each one.

Then use a spoon to cover each wing in wing sauce.

Place baking pan in oven about 10 inches down from the heat source and bake for 5 minutes.

Pull out the baking pan and use tongs to flip over each wing.

Then use a spoon to cover the second side in sauce.

Place baking pan back in oven about 10 inches down from the heat source and bake for another 5 minutes.

Now your hot chicken wings will be nice and crisped up and totally flavorful and delicious!

You can pile them on a plate and serve with ranch and/or blue cheese dressing for dipping.

Printable Crock Pot Wings Recipe

Which one of the hot wing sauce recipes catches your fancy?  Have you ever tried crock pot wings?  I hope you enjoy these crispy crock pot chicken wings as much as my family does!

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