Here's to John Young
While reading the book, ‘Buffalo: Lake City in Niagara Land’ (image credits - published in 1981), I came across this interesting tidbit on the subject of the Buffalo chicken wing. The story goes, that a delivery driver confused an order when dropping off a shipment of chicken parts to the Anchor Bar. Instead of refusing the order, Therese Bellissimo prepared the wings by throwing them into a deep fryer and served them up as appetizers at the bar. She served the wings along with blue cheese and celery and thus the chicken wing was born. But wait… there was no mention of hot sauce to go along with that original recipe.
That’s where John Young (top image) comes in. John Young was the owner of Wings ‘n’ Things right here in Buffalo. He eventually laid claim to the title of ‘King of the Wings’ for coming up with his famous hot and spicy ‘mambo’ sauce. There was not much more information other than John crediting himself with ‘revolutionizing the chicken wing’, and if that is true, then I think we owe the man some credit. I mean, come on… isn’t the sauce the secret ingredient that stole the show after the wings took their first deep fried dip? I’m sure that Frank (bottom image) and Therese came up with their own version along the way, but I had heard over the years that there was some confusion as to who all of the chicken wing attributors were... and just what they attributed.
If anyone else has any information substantiating or disproving John Young’s claim, let’s hear it. Otherwise, I’d say that the least we could do is say thanks for helping to put our city on the culinary map. And just check out the cool post card (at least that’s what it looks like) that promoted his claim to fame.
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drl
In the 80s, I frequented his location in the Central Park Plaza on the East Side. I always understood him as being the originator of the wing we eat today. The smell and taste was very distinctive and unlike any other I have had since. One thing interesting about JY's version was that he left the tip of the wing on (the part that has a triangle end) as a part of the standard order.
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chris69
I thought the ice cream sunday came from an ice cream store on broadway
I thought the hamburger came from Hamburg, NY
I always thought there was a rather large culinary history in Buffalo that doesnt get the respect or recognition it deserves.
Thats a great idea for a recipe book for anyone interested. THE CULINARY HISTORY OF BUFFALO (from chicken wings to beef on weck to pierogi to loganberry....this is Buffalo!)
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viking
The spicy version of wing is definitely a African American thing, in an earlier post I gave a version of the story as told to me from a person who was present at the first offering. The suggestion to add hot sauce came from Black individuals. Pasta sauce & hot sauce where the first try. A couple of car sales reps who where the afternoon customers, verified this particular story. Also a company called JLB Provisions now the Meating Place taught the preparation of wings to over 50 sub, pizza places trying to copy the success of La Nova & the Casa Di Pizza with wings. At one time most of wings sold in Buffalo were sold by either Will Poultry or JLB. Wings were first tried in Chicago in 1978, by the president of Illinois labor counsel and four Greek restaurant owners at a Hotel private party.
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