Martha Stewart’s baked chicken wings need just three pounds of wings, salt, and a hot oven, plus a two-ingredient sriracha buffalo sauce. They bake at 450F for 45 minutes and feed 4 to 6 in 50 minutes total.
The recipe is an exact match from marthastewart.com, where it is published with three sauce options and her official storage and reheating guidance. Her team bills it as almost too easy, and everything below, sauces included, follows that page without changes.
Roast the wings directly on the bare metal of the baking sheet, because that hot contact is what crisps the skin to an almost-fried finish. Parchment insulates and leaves them pale, so if you must line the pan for cleanup, her rule is foil only.
Martha Stewart Baked Chicken Wings
Course: Chicken, DinnerCuisine: AmericanDifficulty: Easy4-6
servings5
minutes45
minutes450
kcal50
minutesThese crispy oven wings skip the fryer, the batter, and the mess. Whisk the sauce while they bake, then toss everything in one bowl and carry it straight to the table.
Ingredients
3 lb (1.4kg) chicken wings, cut in half at joints, wing tips removed
Coarse salt
- For the sriracha buffalo sauce:
¼ cup (60ml) sriracha
2 tablespoons (30g) melted unsalted butter
Celery sticks and crumbled blue cheese, for serving (optional)
Directions
- Prep the wings. Preheat oven to 450F (230C). Pat the wings dry with paper towels, season with salt, and arrange in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet.
- Bake. Bake until golden and cooked through, about 45 minutes.
- Sauce and serve. Whisk the sriracha and melted butter in a large bowl, add the hot wings, and toss to coat. Serve with celery and blue cheese if you like.
Notes
- Notes (from Martha’s original):
Pat them dry: just like searing meat, drying the skin speeds browning and helps the fat render as efficiently as possible in the hot oven.
Cutting: halving whole wings through the joint makes them easier to eat and lets guests choose between flats and drumettes. Leaving them whole works fine too. - Variations (from Martha’s original):
Maple-Dijon: whisk ¼ cup (60ml) pure maple syrup with 3 tablespoons (45ml) grainy Dijon mustard. Toss with the baked wings and serve with lemon wedges.
Sweet-and-sour orange: simmer 1 cup (240ml) sherry vinegar with ⅓ cup (70g) light brown sugar, whisking to dissolve, until reduced to ¼ cup (60ml). Slice a halved orange into thin half moons, pour the hot sauce over the wings and orange slices, and toss well.
FAQs
Why do these wings need only salt before baking?
The skin carries enough fat to fry itself in a 450F (230C) oven. As it renders over the 45 minutes, that fat crisps the skin from within, so flour or baking powder coatings become unnecessary.
Salt still does real work, pulling surface moisture out so browning starts sooner. It’s the opposite philosophy of her buttermilk fried chicken, which builds its crust through a two-day soak and a dredge.
Why does the sauce go on after baking, not before?
Both sauce ingredients would fail at this oven temperature. Butter burns well below it, and sriracha’s sugars scorch into bitterness long before the meat cooks through.
Sauced skin also steams instead of crisping, which undoes the whole bake. Tossing hot wings in the bowl at the end means the sauce clings to the craggy surface and stays bright and fresh-tasting.
Why remove the wing tips before baking?
Tips are almost all skin and bone, so they char long before the flats and drumettes finish. There’s no meat on them worth eating anyway.
Don’t toss them, though. Wing tips are loaded with collagen, which makes them one of the best free additions to homemade chicken stock. Stash them in a freezer bag until stock day.
How do I know the wings are cooked through?
At the 45-minute mark they should look deep golden with crackly, rendered skin, and the meat should pull cleanly from the bone. Juices run clear when a drumette is pierced.
An instant-read thermometer should show at least 165F (74C) in the thickest piece, though wings stay juicy well past that. Their dark meat and fatty skin can ride to 180F (82C) and only get more tender.
How do leftover wings store and reheat?
Her official numbers: refrigerate leftovers up to three days in an airtight container. Reheat at 375F (190C), about 5 minutes in an air fryer or 15 in the oven, until crisp outside and hot through.
Her page adds that unsauced wings reheat better than sauced ones, so hold some back plain if you expect leftovers. Building a game-day spread? Her deviled eggs also come together right before serving.
