I found this recipe from Africanbites last year and followed through exactly. My brother was said it was good, but the flavors weren’t strong enough. I trusted his opinion because at his job, he was often served jerk chicken. My husband agreed the flavor was mellow, but wasn’t strong enough either.
This time, I doubled and maybe even tripled the recipe. I didn’t have some of the ingredients, so I used what I had and the flavor was pretty spot on! We omitted the bonnet peppers and hot pepper flakes (which would’ve taken the jerk wings to another level of awesomeness, because we wanted our girls to have it too). We also used close to no salt because the spices are plenty of placid ; maybe only about 1 tsp.
I adapted the recipe based on what I had. I pretty much doubled (or tripled )her recipe for a more robust flavor.
Ingredients
5 lbs chicken wings (I used 3 Costco size party wing packages)
3 Tablespoon onion powder
3 Tablespoon garlic powder
1 Tablespoon dried thyme
2 teaspoon freshly ground white pepper
1 Tablespoon smoked paprika
2 Tablespoon ground nutmeg spice
2 -3 Tablespoons brown sugar
1 Tablespoon Maggie powder (bouillon)
Salt and black pepper to taste (start with 1/2 tsp)
• 4 tablespoons dried green onion flakes (I have the one in bulk on Amazon)
• Optional: 1 Tablespoon any type of Hot pepper–Chili, cayenne pepper, pepper flakes or fresh bonnet peppers
Steps
1- Throw all the ingredients in a large ziplock bag or mixing bowl, mix it up thoroughly. I let it marinate for about 4 hours.
2- Line up wings in a baking tray or plate and grease the pan- I line mine up in a rectangular baking dish and top another layer of wings on the greased baking rack stand (I usually do the same for my baked fries to get the most out of cooking time and space since I only really use my toaster oven).
3-Pre-heat oven to 425F and bake for about 20 minutes.
4-Flip over top rack wings and continue to bake for another 25 minutes. Don’t worry about the wings underneath the rack stand.
5- Move the chicken wings on top of the oven rack onto a serving plate and continue to bake the bottom layer of chicken now for another 3-5 minutes if you want a slightly crisper jerk chicken (or put it on top of the now, empty baking rack to bake for 3-5 minutes).
6- We served ours with coconut quinoa rice (simply quinoa cooked in half coconut milk and half in water- topped the last minute with chopped cilantro and scallion) and stir-fried okra (just seasoned with a little salt).
We highly recommend having it with hot sauce. We used Red Hot’s Original, but I can see tabasco pairing extremely well with it too. It tasted like a smokier version of buffalo wings!
Have you ever had Jerk Chicken before? Any other tips on how you make your Jerk Chicken? Are there spices you like to use that’s not on this list?