The Best Homemade Buffalo Wings in the World

Being Super Bowl weekend and all, I wanted to share my personal recipe for Bufallo Wings. While good fried wings from the restaurant are awesome, I find that an oven yields the best results at home. I have a convection roast mode on my oven that is great for this, but the regular bake setting works fine:

Sauce

1/2 stick (4 tablespoons) butter - the good stuff
1/2 cup Frank's Red Hot - Original (Not the Buffalo flavor)
1 tablespoon Louisiana Hot Sauce - Original
1-2 tablespoons Tabasco pepper sauce (depending on desired heat level)
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

Wings

up to 36 wing pieces (flats and/or drumettes) - Fresh, room temperature, patted dry
salt
pepper
cayenne pepper (optional)
canola oil
Pam cooking oil spray

1. Sauce - Melt the butter over low heat. Add the brown sugar, then add vinegar, and hot sauces. Cook on lowest heat for 3-5 minutes, then turn off heat source.

2. Wings.
a. Pre-heat oven to 425. Use convection or convection roast feature if available.
b. Sprinkle a little salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper to all sides of wing pieces.
c. Brush a thin coating of canola oil to all side of wings. (This helps crispiness.)
d. Line sheet pan with aluminum foil, add wire rack insert, and spray rack with Pam.
e. Evenly space on rack(s) making sure they don't touch, and place in middle rack of oven.
f. The wings take 25-30 minutes to cook. Depending on the oven, setting, and number of wings, you may need to move the wings around or even flip them. The skin should be crispy and golden.

Once the wings are done and out of the oven but still on the racks, use a clean brush to brush on the Buffalo sauce. Instead of a big soupy bowl of sauced wings, I prefer to serve the wings crispy with a side of additional sauce to dip one by one. Add another side of blue cheese dressing and you are good to go.

If you have a good exhaust fan, you will appreciate it. If not, be prepared to open a window. The oil and aluminum foil help, but the chicken fat dripping into the sheet pan tends to smoke.

Conservatives are Happier than Liberals...

... Because conservatives don't buy the dogma of equality. So says a NYU research paper.

Rationalizing inequality—for example, by seeing it as emerging from a fair, legitimate, and meritocratic system—serves a palliative function not only in the United States, but in nine other countries as well. That is, right-wingers report greater happiness and satisfaction than left-wingers around the world, and most especially in countries where the overall quality of life is relatively low. The endorsement of meritocratic beliefs is also associated with subjective well-being in these countries. Furthermore, meritocratic beliefs account for the association between political orientation and subjective well-being to a significant degree.

Now, I don't like placing myself on the left-right spectrum, but if I do subscribe to the traditional Protestant work ethic, and accept inequality, so I guess that puts me on the right. And happy I am.

To go Bible for a minute, I think about Jesus' parable on the talents shows that even though each of us inherit or are given unequal resources, we are expected to do the most we can in our life to be better and do better. At the same time, the poor will always be with us, and the Proverbs make it clear that "He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God."

So I am pro-meritocracy and pro-charity. I give credit and thanks to God for my good blessings, and recognize that the more blessings I have the bigger my responsibility to do good for others. But I don't think you can have virtue without choice, so taxes and a collectivist society are not the tools I prefer to help the needy.

The Good Ol' Days: Interesting article

Steven Malanga is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, which I am not familiar with but found, thanks to Wikipedia, that sorta-conservatives William Kristol and Peggy Noonan are on the board, so I guess that would put it right of center on most issues. No big deal, but I try to learn a little about the authors to see where they are come ig from. In any event, Malanga asks an interesting question, Can Free Markets Survive In a Secularized World?

It begins:

The 18th Century English cleric and theologian John Wesley was troubled by a paradox that emerged as his teaching spread. He, like other Protestant thinkers stretching back to Calvin, taught that one could honor God through hard work and thrift. The subsequent burst of industry and frugality generated by Wesley’s message improved the lot of many of his working-class followers and helped advance capitalism in England. But, “wherever riches have increased, the essence of religion has decreased in the same proportion,” Wesley observed, and subsequently pride and greed are growing more common, he complained.

In order to survive and thrive, Malanga poses, capitalism needs restraint, and that restraint has historically been the virtues preached in the Protestant work ethic. But success has largely changed America from a country of work to a country of consumption, and thrift has been replaced with debt. He concludes:

People instinctively know something is missing, just not what. A religious revival in America seems unlikely. Is it equally as unlikely that our institutions, most especially our schools, would once again promote the virtues that made capitalism thrive and Western societies prosper--not just hard work, but thrift and integrity, or what we once called the Protestant ethic?

Let me see if I figure out how to embed a video:

More on Taxes

I love it when I find people who agree with me. Of course, it would be more accurate to say I agree with them, but this is my blog so I am allowed to have illusions of grandeur. Anyways, just after I finished the last post, look what I find: Masonomist Russel Roberts speaks up in Forbes:

I'm proposing today a radical re-imagining of our tax system. I am recommending the elimination of the payroll tax. The payroll tax is a regressive tax that falls harshly on the poor. And it is deceptive, an unacceptable characteristic of a tax in a democracy.

Half of the payroll tax appears to be paid by employers. In fact, studies of the payroll tax show that the employer merely lowers worker compensation in response to the tax burden. So workers pay virtually the entire 15%.

Worse, the payroll tax gives the illusion that taxes are "contributions" toward future social security payments.

It's like he was in my head or something. He continues with a list of government spending prescriptions:

--Eliminating all corporate welfare. Corporate welfare rewards those corporations that excel at lobbying rather than serving their customers. Eliminating it will save $100 billion annually.

--Implementing spending reductions in all departments of 10%, saving over $250 billion. Such cuts in a federal budget heading toward $3 trillion are hardly draconian. They merely return spending to the level of a year or two ago.

--Making small across-the-board increases in the income tax rate, yielding $350 billion. The poorest workers will in fact see a significant improvement in their after-tax income because the elimination of the payroll tax will overwhelm the increase in income taxes. The richest Americans will see a slightly larger increase because their payroll tax contributions are currently capped.

Rock on.

Risk & Profits

Economist Arnold Kling speaks on Minsky-nomics:

Minsky's key insight is that risk tolerance is cyclical. Investors will be risk averse for a while, and then gradually they will loosen up. Eventually, they become more and more complacent, until euphoria sets in, leading to bubbles and manias. This continues until a crash takes place, after which investors revert to being highly risk averse.

Minsky described this risk tolerance cycle in terms of three phases: hedge finance; speculative finance; and ponzi finance. During the hedge finance phase, investors are allergic to risk. You can say, "Here is a project that is probably going to offer some really nice returns," and the investors reply, "No, I don't want to touch it. I'm not buying anything that has a down side."

During the speculative finance phase, investors make reasonable trade-offs between risk and return. During the ponzi finance phase, investors ignore risks. Giving subprime borrowers option ARM mortgages was ponzi finance in every sense of the word.

Minsky's cyclical risk theory explains why the billions pumped into banks mostly failed to unfreeze the credit markets. Even with huge amounts of capital to loan, banks are unwilling to do it if they don't trust the borrowers. It is also why "tax-rebate" checks won't work since smarter people use the money THE WAY THEY SHOULD and pay off debt or put it into savings. Kling then gives his opinion on how to escape the current hedge finance phase we find ourselves in:

Under the circumstances of hedge finance, the only way that businesses are comfortable expanding is by financing investment out of profits. Another element of Minsky's thinking is that profits are the key to escaping a recession. Government deficits can contribute to this process by raising profits.

Makes sense to me. If companies had more money left over at the end of each day, they would be both psychologically prepared and financially motivated to put profits to use by way of hiring, investing, and purchasing.

The pro-profit measures being discussed center mostly on corporate taxes and corporate contributions to the payroll tax. I think corporations should be tolled or taxed in some way, but I won't get into that right now. However, I do say get rid of FICA altogether. It would not only raise profits for corporations, but it would eliminate a most regressive tax on the low and middle class.

Who are we kidding? There is no magical vault with all the FICA contributions stashed in them, waiting for disbursement in Social Security payments. The money collected from FICA goes into general revenue to be wasted spent without distinction. Replace it with a single progressive income tax that is highly tiered, like 1% for every additional $10k in income, and at non-bailout/stimulus spending levels, we could come out ahead with a top tax bracket around 35% for people making $350k or more a year. Not ideal, but better.

The good ol' days

I have been reading Life: The Movie by Neal Gabler, which is a book that covers the history of Entertainment in America. What can I say, I was a sucker for the $1 book sale at the public library. Anyways, it has reconfirmed that the "Good ol' Days," where everyone was virtuous and lived without a sensationalist media and wicked entertainment corrupting their minds, well, it never really existed. People have always been pretty much the same, the media has always loved a good story first and facts second, and entertainment of dubious moral value has always been way too easy to find. One thing that has changed dramatically, however, is the strength of the institutions that have historically counterbalance individual desire. Per David Brooks in his recent NYT editorial:

In this way of living, to borrow an old phrase, we are not defined by what we ask of life. We are defined by what life asks of us. As we go through life, we travel through institutions — first family and school, then the institutions of a profession or a craft.

Each of these institutions comes with certain rules and obligations that tell us how to do what we’re supposed to do.

Families. schools, work. Looks like America is striking out at the moment.

How in a conversation on institutions does Brooks not mention church? Does an oblique reference to charities count?

Now, I have some very dear friends that are not a part of any church or organized religion. They are great people full of love, and will remain great, caring, productive members of society wherever their exploration of faith takes them. They are philosophers. They contemplate right and wrong, seek meaning in life, and want to leave the world a better place. But as my marriage has taught me (I love you, honey), not everyone is a philosopher. Most people seek the structure and comfort of institutions. After all, that is what Brooks is writing about.

As tonight's The Office highlights, no one likes the morality police. Yet, even the harshest critics of religions will admit the ability of faith to mold behavior. So any nostalgia of institutions without even considering faith rings a little hollow to me. Still, this is an important topic, and Brooks makes several good points. Institutions, at their best, can indeed save and bring a purpose to life.

Truth in Black and White

Republicans are proud of the House Republicans, and Democrats are disgusted by them. Me, on the outside of both parties, find cold comfort in the words of Richard Spencer:

The GOPers have essentially gone into “principled opposition” mode in which they’ll start voting against the kind of Big Government legislation they know will pass anyway—and which they would have undoubtedly supported had a Republican been in the White House and their party been in control of Congress. Such stalwarts of limited government would have also voted “nay” last night if Obama had proposed, say, a trillion-dollar prescription drug plan, a proposal for the greater federalization of public schools, or a 700 billion fund for the “troubled assets” of the Wall Street bankstas.

Ahh, reality.

When Terrorists Make Sense

In a recent Op-Ed, Muammar Qaddafi provides important non-western insight concerning the Isreal/Palestine crisis.

Now, as Gaza still smolders, calls for a two-state solution or partition persist. But neither will work.

The problem with the UN's partition of the Palestine region was that legislation is not sufficient to bring a country into being, at least without repercussions. Throughout history, the preferred method has been total conquest and subjugation, or at least the threat thereof. To no great surprise, the neighbor Arab states did not want to accept the UN's mandate, and war soon broke out. Isreal actually conquered additional lands from it original borders, but in my humble opinion, did not go far enough. It should have conquered the now disputed Gaza strip and West Bank. If it had, the people living there could have assimilated into Isreal, regardless of their religous and ethinc backgrounds. As Qaddafi poits out:

Assimilation is already a fact of life in Israel. There are more than one million Muslim Arabs in Israel; they possess Israeli nationality and take part in political life with the Jews, forming political parties. On the other side, there are Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Israeli factories depend on Palestinian labor, and goods and services are exchanged. This successful assimilation can be a model for Isratine.

Sixty years later, the solution remains a single state. Muslims, Christians, and Jews should all be allowed to live within a secular Israel, share the holy lands, and participate in the political process together. How this happens may not be pretty, and it is likely that even then the fighting would not end forever, but it certainly has a better historical track record than outside government intervention.

On Not Blogging.

Busy. Overwhelmed. Distracted. Annoyed. Those are just a few of the reasons I have not posted in over a week. So I'll try to make up for lost time a little bit. But before I begin, let me give perhaps a more honest reason.

I don't know what to make of the new President.

For all my liberal and/or Democratic friends that may read this, please continue to love me, be my friend, and understand it may be a personal flaw I am working through. The fact is, I just never caught Obama-mania.

That said, I am glad Obama won instead of McCain. Conservative/Republican friends, please continue reading.

Honestly, I didn't see enough difference between them in their actual politics, so I figure it would be best to let the Democrat enact Democratic Party policies instead of a Republican. That, and I hold out a shred of hope that the Presidency can at some point in our near future revert to more of a constitutionally limited position, in which case it would be great to have a charismatic, diplomatic, and youthful leader giving brilliant speaches as opposed to an old, ailing curmudgeon.

In any event, I do wish President Obama well. All the media genuflection over Obama was entirely predicatable given the current era of extreme sensationalism and dead-horse flogging, but Obama can't really be blamed for that. Still, one of the main reasons I didn't post is that almost everthing I was reading was Obama-related, and I am 1) over it and 2) taking a wait and see approach.

Really, the more I read history, philosophy, religous texts, and current news/views, the more convinced I am that the best government systems will not work if its people are morally bankrupt and the best economic policies will not work if people refuse to play by the rules and consider the common good. So while I enjoy, and will continue, posting on government and economics, I will try to keep the human element center stage in my mind, if not in my posts.

Thank you MSM & Thrift as a Virtue

It's not often I can say this, but when both of my blog posts come courtesy of CNN (see below) and Newsweek, I have to give props to the much derided main stream media.

Joseph Epstein's article on prudence as a virtue again hits it on the head. If I was a narcissist, or was blind to the reality that only 3-4 people have visited this little corner of the internet, I would think the guy read my blog posts on Keynes and virtues. But while my hopes for originality have perhaps been dashed, I am much the happier to know that there is a growing recognition of the value of virtues that our modern society until so recently considered outdated and irrelevant.

The brief article is worth a read in its entirety, but a couple nuggets:

If the old game plan for American ambition entailed the slow but steady accretion of wealth, the new plan called for getting it now, lots of it, and as soon as possible.

This spirit is distinctly not the spirit of thrift. At a lower level of ambition, neither of course was the spirit of thrift to be found in the millions of Americans who allowed themselves to lapse into heavy credit-card debt or bought houses they couldn't afford, thinking, hope against hope, that they could somehow swing it, that something, surely, would turn up that would allow them to live beyond their means in perpetuity.

Preach. And on the current situation:

The recent global economic meltdown has put paid to unfettered financial optimism. But will it restore the spirit of thrift to Americans in their economic behavior? Hard to predict, of course, especially when government financing, backed into the corner of the present crisis, is far from being able to practice thrift. Quite the reverse. Balanced budgets, we have been told, are a thing of the past, and not likely to be part of the immediate future. The necessary thing, we are also told, is to get credit flowing again, to trigger people's spending, so that the economy can swing back into action. In all this, the practice of thrift doesn't really come into the conversation. Thrift is at its base anti-Keynesian. Lord Keynes, after all, said that "in the long run we are all dead." He also said, "The engine which drives enterprise is not thrift, but profit."

Is it possible to spend and yet not be spendthrift? It once was and had better be again, or we may all have had the course. (The name of the course is Western Civilization, Decline and Fall.)

Right on Joe, but can I maybe get a little mention next time?