Spicy Thai Peanut Sauce for the SuperBowl

It’s Super Bowl week and if you’re like me, it’s always a good thing to have a solid plan when devising your game day menu. I like to stick to my strengths, chips and salsa, guacamole, a heaping platter of nachos or maybe a spinach and artichoke dip. Depending on the culinary prowess of my invited guests, I like to leave a few last minute menu options to “WOW” the crowd.

In my opinion, a Super Bowl menu isn’t complete unless it has pizza and wings. This week I’m giving you two tasty options to spice up your menu. The recipes are simple for the average foodie and most importantly they can be prepared ahead of time.

Roasted Chicken Wings in a Spicy Thai Peanut Sauce

1 red onion, small dice

1 red bell pepper

1 green bell pepper

10 roma tomatoes, small dice

6 garlic cloves, minced

3 serrano peppers, small dice

2 tablespoons fresh ginger, rough chop

½ cup Kikkoman’s teriyaki glaze

½ cup brown sugar

2 tablespoons peanut butter, creamy

2 cups water

In a medium sized saucepot, sweat the peppers, onion, garlic and ginger in a tablespoon of peanut or sesame oil on medium high heat. When the components have started to caramelize, add the diced tomatoes. When the fibers of the tomatoes have begun to break down, deglaze the pan with the teriyaki glaze. When you’ve scraped up all of the fond at the bottom of the saucepot, add the brown sugar, peanut butter and stir until everything is fully incorporated. The last step is to add the water. Bring the sauce to a slow boil, reduce the heat to medium low and let this simmer for about a half hour. Remove the sauce from the heat and let cool. When the sauce has cooled, use your immersion blender and puree the sauce. It is certainly fine to do this a few days ahead of time. The sauce holds very well when refrigerated and the flavors are the true benefactors of a few days of getting to know one another.

To roast the wings, take a 3 pounds of raw, thawed, chicken wings and coat in olive oil, with a little salt and pepper. Transfer the coated wings to a sheet pan and roast in a 375-degree oven. When the wings are thoroughly cooked through, carefully pour off the juices from the sheet pan. The idea here is to get the wings and the sheet pan as dry as possible. The next step will be to place the sheet pan under the broiler of your oven to crisp the skin. If there’s too much moisture from the sheet pan, the wings will simply steam and that’s now what we’re trying to do. If you’ve successfully dried the wings, the skin of the wings will crisp nicely under the broiler. When the wings are crispy, remove them from the broiler and toss in your room temperature sauce.

To plate. Using your finest white platter, add the tossed wings to the center and arrange them artfully across the plate. Pour any leftover sauce over the top of the wings and garnish with fresh chopped cilantro and minced serrano peppers.

Second option.

Spicy Thai Peanut and Chicken Pizza

These days, it’s so much easier to make pizzas at home without the troubles of making your own dough. I’ve found that many flatbreads sold in a majority of grocery stores works very well for making pizzas. If you have a pizza stone, this is a perfect time to use it.

To make the pizza, take your store bought flatbread and cover it with the peanut sauce. Add a chopped, grilled or roasted chicken breast and disperse it evenly over the entire pizza. I would also suggest adding some chopped up bacon bits to the pizza as well. There’s something magical about the combination of peanut sauce and bacon. Trust me on this one; it’s a pretty great thing! Next, cover the flatbread with shredded mozzarella cheese and dust the edges with some grated Parmesan or Romano cheese. Lay a few slices of thinly sliced red onion to the top of the pizza and transfer the pizza to your stone in a preheated 400-degree oven. When the cheese of the pizza begins to brown or caramelize, remove the pizza from the oven. Lastly, add fresh chopped cilantro to the top of the pizza and enjoy.

Buen Provecho!