Yesterday I posted about the kitschiest KFC in existence but today I’m happy to post about a treasure that far too few know about…the birthplace of Buffalo Wings.
Most people don’t realize that Buffalo Wings are native to Buffalo, NY–did people really think they had anything to do with the large land-based mammal? When I was a teen, I would love to go with friends to Buffalo’s Albright-Knox Art Gallery to gawk at their amazing collection of abstract painting (including Arshile Gorky’s The Liver is the Cock’s Comb and Reuben Nakian’s Mars & Venus), and then b-line it for the infamous Anchor Bar where Buffalo Wings were born.
Food mythology, as recorded by the Anchor Bar, says that the American bar staple is only 43-years-old and as Italian American as pasta, pizza or spaghetti sauce:
On a Friday night [in 1964], Dominic Bellissimo was tending bar at the now infamous Anchor Bar Restaurant in Buffalo, NY. Late that evening a group of Dominic’s friends arrived at the bar….[he] asked his mother, Teressa to prepare something for his friends to eat…At about midnight, Teressa brought out two plates she had prepared in the kitchen and placed them on the bar…Teressa had deep fried the wings and flavored them with a secret sauce. The wings were an instant hit and it didn’t take long for people to flock to the bar to experience this new eating sensation. (source)(wiki agrees)
To Teressa Bellissimo’s credit, she may have invented one of the only American foods (outside of the Southern & Southwestern varieties) that can be ordered super hot & spicy. Accompanied by hot sauce (including a variation labeled “suicidal”), blue cheese dip and celery, the final product is a symphony of flavors and good-quality chicken wings. The surroundings are a little country-western, the service is a little too familiar, but the wings are works of art.
You may want to try to make Buffalo Wings at home (how-to), or stroll over to western New York to pick-up a plate of yummies. If distance is a problem the Anchor Bar also delivers–frozen, of course–to you…I LOVE AMERICA! (link)
AWARD for quirkiest Buffalo Wing-related website is the straight-forward and sweet-sounding BUFFALO WINGS & VODKA blog which features the tagline “There’s Nothing Funny About Law School”–oh how true..(link)
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