Snacks · Wings & party bites

Air fryer chicken wings

Name: Air fryer chicken wings
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 25 min
Total time: 35 min
Yield: 4 servings
Ingredients: 900 g chicken wings, split into flats and drums, dried well; 1 tbsp baking powder; 3/4 tsp salt; 1 tsp garlic powder; 2 tsp paprika; 3 tbsp hot sauce

Wings tossed with baking powder and air-fried until the skin crackles — no batter, no oil bath. Skin makes this a mid-score food and there's no pretending otherwise, but next to the fried version it's the same party snack with the deep-fryer subtracted.

Time: 35 min (10 prep + 25 cook)
Servings: 4
Per serving: 575 kcal
Protein: 53 g

Ingredients

900 g chicken wings, split into flats and drums, dried well900 g
1 tbsp baking powder12 g
3/4 tsp salt4 g
1 tsp garlic powder3 g
2 tsp paprika4 g

To toss

3 tbsp hot sauce (optional)40 g

Every ingredient links to its food page — same data, same score, same formula.

Steps

Dry the wings hard with paper towels — surface water is the enemy of crisp skin, and this step matters more than any seasoning.
Toss with the baking powder, salt, garlic powder and paprika. The baking powder raises the skin's pH and draws moisture out, which is the whole crisping trick — powder, not soda.
Air-fry at 200°C (400°F) in a single layer, 22–25 minutes, flipping once, until deep golden and blistered. In batches if needed; crowding steams them.
Toss with the hot sauce if using — or serve it alongside so half stay dry and crisp.

Where do the calories sit?

Nearly all in the skin, which is also where the flavour is — that's the wing bargain and there's no engineering around it. What this method removes is the frying oil, which is the part nobody was tasting anyway.

Why this score

moderately filling

No single route carries this one — a moderate amount of protein, volume and fiber.

Three routes to fullness — one is enough

38% of kcal

41% water

1 g/Mcal

What pulls it down

How scores work

Computed on the finished dish, not an average of the parts: 2300 kcal goes into the pot, 963 g of ingredients comes out as ~660 g of food → 349 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water, and energy density is the score's biggest lever — so we show the math. Full formula here.

Per

Calories: 349
Protein: (38%); 32 g
Fat: (61%); 23 g
Carbohydrates: (1%); 1 g
of which sugar: <1 g
Fiber: <1 g
Sodium: 969 mg

Percentages are the share of calories from each macronutrient.

Computed from the ingredients' USDA data — nothing typed by hand. Every number is traceable, every score recomputable.

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Photo: AI-generated. Nutrition and score are computed from the ingredients with the published formula — this recipe hasn't been kitchen-tested by us yet.