The Worst Store-Bought Wing Sauce Is Made By A Struggling Chain Restaurant

Who doesn't love a good chicken wing? Whether you make your own crispy wings, fresh and piping hot at home, or go out to buy some from your favorite store or restaurant, one thing is certain: you gotta have the right sauce. These days, the shelves at any local grocer are loaded up with so many wing sauces that decision paralysis will quickly descend on any unwitting shopper. Lucky for you, we at Tasting Table have done some of the legwork and created a list of 15 store-bought wing sauces, ranked from worst to best. And at the bottom of our list by a long shot, we have Hooters with their medium wing sauce.

Hooters is reportedly getting ready to file for bankruptcy, and tragically, this wing sauce won't be keeping it afloat. Everything from the texture to the flavor falls flat, leaving it seriously struggling to put up even a ghost of a fight against heavy hitters like Sweet Baby Ray's, Frank's RedHot, or our top pick, Cholula. Hooters isn't exactly known for its wings, unlike Wing Stop (which also ranked much higher on our list), so maybe it shouldn't be a surprise that its mass produced sauce was the worst store-bought wing sauce we tried.

So, what makes this sauce a bust? First, let's look at what a good wing sauce should have. Wing sauce doesn't necessarily have to be buffalo sauce (though we've also done a comprehensive ranking solely on buffalo sauces, for the curious), but they do need a heavy pop of flavor to really saturate every bite of chicken. Hooters medium wing sauce doesn't have any tang, any traces of garlic, or any pungent spices playing on the palate. In fact, despite being branded as a medium level of spice, it doesn't even have any kick. There's a lot of richness, but no depth or balance.

The texture is pretty off-putting, too. A wing sauce should be thick rather than watery, since it needs to stick to the wing well. But Hooters medium wing sauce comes out of the jar like peanut butter: in a thick, big glop. Spread on a chicken wing, it even kind of looks like peanut butter, and the texture is like biting into a smear of room temperature butter thickly spread over some bread. It's an all-around unappetizing experience. If you really want to stick with Hooters, go for the hot wing sauce instead, since it's not quite as unbearably thick or flavorless. But really, you have so many great choices available, why spend your hard-earned money on anything but the best?