Steny’s Milwaukee, WI

I have heard about Steny’s Tavern & Grill for quite a few years now, being one who loves the Milwaukee night life.  Steny’s is your true corner Milwaukee pub in every sense of the word.  I have been to Steny’s before, however never had their wings.  It was always on my list to do, however it isn’t the first place I think of when I hear the words “buffalo wings.”  After reading a post about “Best Wing In The City” on OnMilwaukee.com, one reader commented on how you have to try Steny’s for it is under rated and didn’t make the list.  Being a fan of aWingThing.com, I thought I would put this to a test.

Since the rest of the group was out at the new Quaker Steak and Lube , I thought I should fall back to my college days and recruit a few members form my Fraternity Tau Kappa Epsilon .  I figure they fit all of the qualifications to review a night of pool, darts, beer and of course wings!  I rounded up 3 members Rich Mac, Eric Niemi, and Mark Henry.  We decided to try Steny’s on their wing night which is Tuesdays and Thursdays.  They offer 25 cent wings so we came hungry.  Our server, Mary, was awesome and extremely helpful for she knew about the ingredients and the cooking process, but more about that soon.  The drink specials were great and the beer of the night from the Ommegang Brewery, so I was not only happy, but in heaven!  How often do you find your favorite micro brew on special?

We decided to dive in to the wings ordering 16 Medium, 8 Sweet n’ Spicy Garlic, 8 BBQ, 8 Jamaican Jerk, and 16 Hot and Honey.  We were aiming for the Cajun, but Mary suggested we get the Hot and Honey, so we went with it, and thank god we did!  The wings took a while, but with $1.50 pool you tend not to care.  Once the wings came they looked different than your normal buffalo wing, why is that?  It is because they are baked!  Having experimented with baked wings at home, and my first thought was how crispy are they?  Well, unfortunately Steny’s wings were not that crispy, which came to no surprise for me.  Mary explained that the wings are deep fried, tossed in sauce, than baked.  Form what she told me, deep frying was the initial cooking process but isn’t long enough to create the external crisp of the skin.  The wings were very juicy and slid off the bone, but had no initial crunch.  The second thing I noticed was the lack of sauce on each wing.  They had flavor, but having experimented with baking wings, I know that the sauce gets baked into the chicken.

We started off with the Sweet n’ Spicy Garlic, which smelled amazing, however after trying it you could taste more of a traditional buffalo sauce, that was on the extremely mild side, with a hint of garlic.  My friends thought it was lacking in heat, but ok.  The BBQ was not what we expected at all and didn’t seem to resemble BBQ.  To us it tasted more like a baked chicken wing with some kind of sauce.  It is hard to explain what it was like, but not BBQ.  The Medium was great, but I would consider it mild, maybe even a step below mild.  It had a very traditional taste, but not any kick, spice, or heat.  For someone who likes the traditional flavor, but no heat, this is your wing.  I am kind of glad we didn’t get the Mild.  The two wings that we liked the most were the Jamaican Jerk and the Hot n’ Honey.  The Jamaican Jerk initially tasted like baked chicken covered with oregano.  Where the Jerk came from, I am not sure for I couldn’t taste it.  This wing was different from the rest, and didn’t do much for me until dipped in ranch.  The ranch did a 180 for the oregano, chicken, and ranch worked very well.  We dove into the Hot n’ Honey, which was hands down the best of the evening.  The honey was a great flavor, however we all thought where is the hot?  After trying all of them we came to a few conclusions.  They were good, but lacking on two things, sauce and heat.  Most of the sauce seemed to get cooked off in the baking process.  Wanting to leave with a bit of a tingle we ordered 6 hot.  Now this hot was the hottest on the menu.  When I see the hottest on the menu I think of, “I won’t do that again” hot or “Why am I so stupid” hot, but not these wings.  Like the others, it was much milder; however this one had the most distinct buffalo flavor.  It gave me a kick, a zing, and a tingle, but I would chalk it up to a bit above your normal medium at most restaurants.

So what was the conclusion, I thought that they were ok.  The next time I would order extra sauce to see if that amps up the flavor.  Over all it was a very enjoyable experience.  I have to give them credit for they do something very different with their wings.  These are not your traditional wings and are good, but if you like saucy spicy wings, you might want to order extra sauce on the side.

Kyle ‘The Wing Man’ Swetzig

Steny’s get’s 3 out of 5 wings.