Wings Reviewed: Hot, Hot (from the pit), Caribbean Jerk, Bacon Honey Mustard

Genre: Known For Wings Place

Overview: Alright, so Nick’s Pub doesn’t claim to be known for their wings, but with a menu like this, they clearly fit into the genre – I also post the menu because I had a hard time finding their wing flavors online. They cutoff on their online menu:

That’s 24 flavors that can be prepared bone-in or boneless in 3 different styles? That’s 144 different wing experiences. I didn’t check if the 3 styles were also available for boneless wings though, so it may only be 96. Either way, that’s a lot of wings.

There are some things you should know about Nick’s: It’s 21+, smoking IS allowed, they have plenty of TVs and there are great deals during home team (Cardinals & Blues… I guess the Rams don’t count?) sports games. What kind of deals? The two most relevant to this blog are 40¢ wings and $3 premium draft beers. Nick’s has 65 beers on tap, and most of them are eligible for this $3 deal. (all specials, .PDF) This is only my second or third time at Nick’s Pub, and with all these wings and deals, clearly I’ll be back again.

I also took crappy pictures. Should have used flash. Sorry about that.

Hot (traditional)

BAD • FAIR • GOOD • GREAT • BEST

What happens when you take some average buffalo hot sauce and put it on some above average chicken wings? You get some above average wings, that’s what. Among the 24 sauces offered, it seems that not too much time was put into this one, but that’s just fine.

The spice level on the hot wings seems right about on par for the style, the wings are meaty and a little dry in this batch. A bit more sauce could have helped, perhaps. The meat quality seemed pretty good. That said, with all these wing flavors & styles available, I’ll probably keep trying new things before I come back to these guys.

Hot (From The Pit)

BAD • FAIR • GOOD • GREAT • BEST

The “from the pit” variety of wings is in a style that most bars would refer to as “trashed”. Nick’s says this: “Our Traditional Wing tossed in your favorite sauce then crisped on the CharBroiler”.

See the above description for meatiness and spiciness. The CharBroiler elevated these wings from their traditional counterpart, and while they didn’t quite rise to great, they got close. Also of note, the wings appeared to only have grill marks on one side of them. I’ll be curious to try the hot wings in their third preparation, and will be very likely to order other flavors “From the pit” in the future.

Caribbean Jerk

BAD • FAIR • GOOD • GREAT • BEST

I expect Caribbean Jerk wings to have a good amount of sweetness to them but that the other spices would edge out the sweetness as the dominant flavor. With Nick’s Caribbean Jerk wings, the sweetness seemed to be the main thing going on here. That’s not really my style.

That said, the wing preparation was good. These wings were less dry than the Hot wings prepared in the same style. The dude I was dining with said these were his favorite wings of the night, but I’d say that they were tied with the traditional hot for my least favorite. That said, a good wing is a good wing. And these are definitely good wings.

Bacon Honey Mustard

BAD • FAIR • GOOD • GREAT • BEST

This seemed like the craziest flavor on the menu, and the name sounded pretty good so I decided to order it. When they came out, they were basically what I hoped for: Honey Mustard wings with good chunks of real bacon mixed into the sauce.

For the most part, they tasted what you’d think they would taste like. One pleasant side effect seemed to be that this mustard sauce increased the moisture of the wings. These were the juiciest of the four varieties I tried tonight. That being said, the flavor was a little off-the-wall for me. If you love the combination of bacon, honey mustard and chicken, I think you’d find these wings to be great. But for me, they were just on the upper edge of good.

Visited at 7:30pm, 7/31/2013, 6001 Manchester Ave, 63110