When people hear chicken wings, they usually think about the big chain Buffalo Wild Wings. It’s time for people to stop thinking about the crappy quality wings that come from a dirty national chain. As someone who’s favorite food of all time is a plump, bone-in chicken wing with spicy buffalo sauce, I have been looking for a favorite wing place since my old favorite, Sports Page, closed down about 3 years ago. Some of my favorite wings in St. Louis come from Mulligan’s, Domino’s, and Circle 7 Ranch. Saint Louis Wing Company blew all of these places out of the water. 

After reading the many positive reviews of this restaurant, I went in expecting a lot. I was expecting the inside to be big and spacious with many TVs for customers to be able to watch sports. When I arrived to the somewhat hidden location, I walked in and got a strong whiff of buffalo sauce and seasonings. I also noticed how strange the inside of the place was compared to what I was expecting. It was fairly small and there was a combination of high top seating and regular tables and regular chairs. The restaurant is counter-service style with a counter right up front and center when you walk in. The menu was all written on blackboards in colorful chalk ande behind the counter, you could look straight into the kitchen and watch the magic being made. 

The menu features many interesting flavors including spicy fresh jalapeno, traditional hot, Honey BBQ, Toasted Garlic Parmesan, coconut curry, sesame ginger teriyaki, carribean jerk, thai sweet chili, lemon pepper, french honey mustard, honey buffalo, red hot riplets, cajun alfredo w/ crumbled bacon, zesty dry rub, marinara w/ shredded parmesan, ridiculous ranch and rally squirrel. You can order traditional or boneless (if you want), just the wings, or a combo that will include up to two sides and a drink depending on what you get.  I got a 10 wing combo, bone-in (of course), and got just plain fries as the side. They offer a variety of loaded fries if you don’t mind paying a couple extra bucks to upgrade. With my meal, I had the option to choose 2 different flavors for the wings to be tossed in and I went with Traditional Hot and Red Hot Riplet. If you don’t know what Red Hot Riplets are, they are chips made by Old Vienna, which is a company based in St. Louis. The chips are a spicy BBQ flavor and they are my favorite chips of all time. As soon as I saw that flavor, I knew I had to try it. When I ordered it, I was expecting some sort of sauce that had the flavor of the chips. What I got were wings smothered in seasoning which was ground up Red Hot Riplet chips. I’m not usually a big fan of dry rub or seasoned wings compared to wings with sauce. These wings have been the lone exception to that. These wings were absolutely fantastic, filled with flavor and perfectly balancing spice. Not too little and not too much. The quality of the wings was also fantastic as they were tender without being too soft and wet. As for the traditional hot, they were good-not great. If you don’t like droopy and messy wings, then these will not be your style. I do like wings with droopy sauce, but they are not my favorite. They were spicy, but not too spicy to where I couldn’t get through them all without my mouth burning up. These are not my favorite traditional wings I’ve ever had, but they definitely could’ve been worse as the overall taste of the sauce and quality of the meat were both above average.

Now for the grades that I have to give out. On a scale of 1-5, the overall appearance of the restaurant was a 3. The atmosphere was a 3 but that was due in part to the fact that I was there at around 9:00 and there were only a few customers left in the restaurant. The service was good as the person who took my order behind the counter was pleasant and polite, so I’ll give it a 4. The overall taste and quality of the chicken was a 5 for both of the flavors I had. The Red Hot Riplet flavor was obviously a 5, and the traditional hot flavor was a 4. The fries were also very good and unless you really want to load them up, I think saving the few dollars would be a good choice to just keep the fries the way they are. The fries were a 5. Overall, I’d give the quality and taste of the food a 4.7 and the quality of the restaurant and the service a 3.3.