Smoked BBQ Chicken Wings
Hands down, one of the BEST upgrades we’ve made to our cooking arsenal was the addition of an electric Smoker. Like many of you, I was hesitant when Ray mentioned that he’d love to get a smoker. Of course I thought that it would be an expensive purchase, that we’d hardly use.
I mean really, how often would we want to smoke food!?
Boy was I wrong.
It was literally love at first smoke. <– that sounds really weird, but it’s totally true.
5 Reasons we love our Electric Smoker:
- Smoked Food Tastes Awesome – Duh, right?! Most people just think about barbecue ribs or bacon when they think about smoking, but there’s so many other foods that taste amazing when you add smoke. I’m totally blown away at the creative and delicious ways to use smoke to healthfully enhance the flavors of our already favorite foods.
- Healthier Ingredients – I’m sure your local BBQ joint has great tasting food, but it’s cheap conventional CAFO meats that are toxic to our health. By choosing local, naturally raised, pastured meats, organic veggies/ingredients and smoking them at home there’s no more guilt!
- Keep the Kitchen Cool – During the hot summer months, there’s no need to use your stove (which will heat up the kitchen) when you can do your cooking outside instead!
- Less work for ME! – Call it selfish, but Ray’s the primary master-smoker. So when we opt for smoked meals, he’s the cook and I get a break!
- Saves Money – I know you’re probably thinking that I’m nuts when I talk about spending money to SAVE money but trust me, purchasing an electric smoker is a sound investment. Purchasing pork belly and smoking it at home is much less expensive then buying bacon. Cold smoked cheeses are uber pricey, but smoking cheese at home is cheap!
My apologies, I forgot to take a photo of our Masterbuilt Electric Smoker but I’ll update this post with a pretty pic this weekend when we are smoking some deliciousness on Saturday night!
In the first few months since we got our Masterbuilt Electric Smoker, we’ve used it at least once a week. We’ve made 3 kinds of homemade bacon; smoked cheese, salmon, grass fed beef briskets, chicken legs, whole chickens, macaroni and cheese, baked beans, pork chops/steaks, baby back ribs, jalapeño poppers and most frequently we’ve been enjoying Smoked BBQ Chicken Wings.
When I say frequently, I mean that we’ve probably had smoked wings at least 6 times since we got our smoker 3 months ago. They’ve quickly become our Saturday night tradition!
The reason Smoked BBQ Chicken Wings make the dinner rotation so often is because they are so easy to make and taste like a dream. If you are new to smoking they are the perfect fool-proof recipe.
There are few tricks to ensuring that your Smoked BBQ Chicken Wings will be perfect.
Of course I encourage you to always use pasture raised chicken and I also STRONGLY recommend using my Homemade BBQ Spice Rub and my Homemade BBQ Sauce. Both recipes are very easy, delicious and healthy, you’ll never go back to store bought when homemade is that easy!
If you are interested in adding a smoker to your cooking arsenal, I can’t say enough good things about THIS Masterbuilt Electric Smoker, we use and love it.
If you love this Smoked BBQ CHicken Wings Recipe you’ll love my Easy Oven Baked BBQ pork chops, too!

Ingredients
- Pasture Raised Chicken Wings
- My Homemade BBQ Rub
- BBQ Sauce (homemade)
Instructions
- Liberally season your wings with my BBQ Spice Rub and let them hang out in the fridge for up to 24 hours.
- Preheat your smoker to 275 and prepare for smoking according to the manufactures's instructions. Arrange wings in a single layer on your smoker rack. Smoke for 2 hours.
- After about an hour, turn over your wings so that the skin cooks evenly.
- Generously baste you wings with my Easy BBQ Sauce and smoke for an additional 30 minutes.
- Remove your BBQ Smoked Chicken Wings from the smoker and allow them to rest/cool for a few minutes prior to serving.
Your wings look delicious. You really can’t go wrong with smoked BBQ wings. I’m a big fan of using apple wood to smoke chicken, I just love the flavor that it gives.
Just wondering what kind of wood for smpke
Really any work. We like hickory and/Apple
Thanks
I have a Traeger, can’t wait to try these out for Christmas Eve tomorrow!
I’m getting ready to season them, dumb-ish question: Let them hang out in the fridge covered or uncovered? I ask since I have done both, uncovered helping the crispiness but that was only for a couple hours, not 24.
Thank you and HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!!
I keep ours covered.
What wood?
Apple, hickory, cherry, pecan, worm, maple, oak, pine, walnut, peach?
We use apple, hickory or cherry for our wings
Awesome looks on photos.