Nominations for Tour de Wing: Pine Hills

Spring chicken.

It’s spring. And if memory serves correctly, the FLB tries to organize a quarterly food tour. Sure, this past winter’s tour was on the outside edge of the season, but that didn’t stop us from going around Schenectady in search of the best NY Style Pizza Slice.

Perhaps the biggest learning from that tour was that NY Style Pizza might be held in too high regard, at the expense of other, more delicious forms of the dish. I’m not entirely sure I agree, but let’s table that discussion for now.

Because it’s spring, and that means chicken. It used to be that spring was time for our tours of frozen treats. We’ve done soft serve, gelato, homemade hard, and frozen yogurt. But then the summer tour was left for something savory. After the Tour de Italian Deli, I decided never again would we eat spicy meaty treats during the hottest months of the year.

That’s when we made the switch to the spring savory tours. So if you had your heart set on something sweet and cold, you’re just going to have to wait a couple more months.

Today is the day to not only announce the date of the next tour, but also to open the floor up to nominations. So put those thinking caps on, grab your calendar and a pencil, and let’s get geared up for the Tour de Wing: Pine HIlls Edition.

All the fun will take place on Saturday, June 2!

Is that still spring? Yes. That’s still spring. Hey, I’m running a little late this year. With everything. Cut me some slack, okay?

The last time we had a Tour de Wing in Albany it became clear the city needed to be divided up into at least two sections. That first year, when we toured downtown, I promised a Pine Hills tour would be in the near future. A little over a year later, and here we are.

If you’re new to all this, you may wonder what exactly is going to happen on June 2.

Well, anyone and everyone is invited to come along. Even you. Yes, you. If you are reading these words, you’re invited. If you’re friends with someone who is reading these words, you’re invited too. The more the merrier. For real.

Participants will get a map and a scoresheet, and in small groups they will travel to five different places and order the same thing at each stop. In this case it will be buffalo wings. And we’re looking for the best. The official scoresheet will help determine which wing wins the day.

We’ll use the same criteria as last time, so wings will be evaluated based on their skin, meat, and sauce. Those factors will be used to come up with an overall wing score. Then we’ll look at criteria like the side vegetables and the dip. And these factors will be included in a final overall score that takes into consideration the totality of the experience.

At each stop, the check will be divided evenly. Participants will pay their fair share. Then it’s off to the next place.

After all five stops have been completed, scoresheets are turned in. Only completed scoresheets will be valid in the final tabulations.

It’s really a lot of fun.

But more than fun, these tours are also a tremendous learning experience. Because there is nothing quite like having the opportunity to taste five similar versions of the same dish back to back. Not only does it help to reveal and accentuate their differences, but it also helps inform you about your own preferences and the aspects of the food that really matter most in your evaluation.

In the end there will be a winner.

Invariably, when a winner is announced and people see the list of places we visited, they will say, “you should have gone to ‘such and such’ or ‘so and so.’” And I will say, “That’s why we opened up the tour to nominations back in May.”

So now is your chance!

We’re sticking to Pine Hills. It’s a nice tight geographic area. It’s totally walkable. Our results can help inform not just the student population who have the metabolism to eat wings much more than I do, but it can also guide those whose local neighborhood watering holes are in this fun and lively section of the city.

That means at the top of my list are:
1) Crave
2) Graney’s Bar & Grill
3) The Fountain
4) Juniors Bar & Grill
5) Chicken Joe’s

Yes, Chicken Joe’s. Because “chicken” is the first word in their name. Frying chicken is what this place is all about. And sure, it’s cheap college food, but dammit that’s what wings are supposed to be all about. Which brings up a couple other ideas too.

– Washington Tavern is under new ownership. Should they be on the tour for old times sake? Or are they still as good as ever? I’m not sure. Hopefully a reader or two might weigh in on the matter.

-Mild Wally’s is largely a college delivery spot. But they have a huge following. This could be a contender, but if this spot gets promoted into the top five, which place gets kicked to the curb?

-Paesan’s is also super popular, but how are their wings? Surely they sell a lot of them, maybe more than anybody else, but are they worth the fat and calorie load? But if we put a place that’s primarily a pizza delivery joint on the tour, we should narrow it down to just one. Do we go with the big cheese of Paesan’s or the single outpost of Mild Wally’s?

These are big questions.

And I’m certainly open to other places that I might have left off the list. As I said, now is the time to speak and make your voice heard. We want to try the best wings in Pine Hills. Think you know where they are? Let us know.

Just know this, the nomination phase is not a popularity contest. It’s not about telling all your friends to post as many comments as possible. Make the best case you can for the places you love that goes beyond “OMG they are to die for. Totes the best wings eva. Droolz.”

Tell me what makes them great.

Then mark down June 2 on your calendar. It’s a lunch to dinner kind of time frame. The exact time will be announced once the route is finalized. But I’m looking forward to seeing some familiar faces and meeting some new ones! Cheers.