Taking a Flight of Culinary Fancy on the Spicy Wings of a Chicken

Let us now praise spicy chicken wings.

Has anyone stopped to consider the soothing influence that spicy chicken wings have had on our culture?

Have you, for example, ever known anyone to become antisocial while eating spicy chicken wings? I doubt it.

It is nearly impossible to turn hostile or pompous while your fingers are smeared with hot sauce and your mouth is tingling.

Did you know that the inventor of that species of spicy chicken wings called Buffalo chicken wings was accorded a news obituary in The New York Times?

You can look it up. Nov. 6, 1985: “Teressa Bellissimo, Inventor of Spicy Buffalo Wings, Dies.”

All of this comes to mind because last week San Diego-based Foodmaker Inc., owner and operator of Jack in the Box, caused to come into my possession a large quantity of their new spicy chicken wings, now being sold in 1,100 U.S. outlets. I immediately distributed this foodola to my colleagues, keeping but a bare portion.

Later I purchased, at full retail prices, a nine-pack at my neighborhood Jack in the Box in Encinitas.

I will not attempt a culinary review or a comparison with the “mighty wings” at McDonald’s or the “hot wings” at Kentucky Fried Chicken.

I will say that I found Jack’s spicy wings perky but not impertinent, audacious but not belligerent, crunchy but not hard-bitten.

One reason I will not try a full-dress exegesis is that I came under the influence of spicy chicken wings later in life than many of my fellow cultists and don’t yet feel fully qualified for such a task.

I first joined the faith in the fall of 1987 at Spoon’s restaurant in Oceanside and have since transferred my wing devotion to the Red Robin restaurant in Encinitas.

But I digress. The subject here is the Jack in the Box thrust.

“We think that ‘bland’ is out in the ‘90s,” said Mo Iqbal, Foodmaker vice president, in a prepared statement the day the wings hit the Jack menus.

Iqbal is the point man in Foodmaker’s wings push. He uses words like zesty and is also high as a kite on the new toasted ravioli and mini chimichangas.

Nobody knows if he’ll someday be memorialized in The New York Times. But it could happen.

Clothes Make the Marine

Look here.

* Camp Pendleton is cracking down on Marines who wear their camouflage uniforms off base.

Since October, 175 have been caught, with their names being collected for possible punishment. The no-cammies push was started by two gung-ho sergeants and has now been endorsed by top brass.

Noncommissioned officers in mufti are being posted at taco stands, convenience stores, banks, etc. from Oceanside to San Clemente to spot violators.

The Navy, the Army and other Marine bases allow cammies off base. But Pendleton makes no excuses.

“Part of being a Marine is following and enforcing rules,” said an editorial in the base newspaper.

* Private acts, public places.

The 1992 edition of Bob Damron’s Address Book for the USA, Canada, Virgin Islands, Costa Rica and Mexico is now out: listing accommodations, bars, health clubs, bookstores, travel publications and more that cater to gays and lesbians.

Among the “Cruising Areas” listed for San Diego: Balboa Park near 6th and Laurel, the Rose Canyon nature trails and Torrey Pines State Beach, “active bushes at north point of famed nude beach.”

* A K-9 officer with the San Diego Police Department says one suspect who got nipped by a police dog told him he would rather have been shot.

Part of the problem is that suspects tend to be fleeing when they get bit and that means the bite is on the tush.

Also, police dogs don’t respond to English or Spanish. They’re trained only to respond to commands in German.

Special Delivery for Stockholders

Speculation is rampant that the stock market is due for a big tumble. The former boss of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission last week in Coronado predicted a major crash soon.

And now Steve and Eileen Gaffen of University City are giving fair warning.

Their first child, son Ari, was born Oct. 19, 1987, Black Monday when the market dropped 508 points.

Eileen, a publicist, is pregnant again and due to deliver today, also a Monday.

“I’m telling all my friends to sell short,” says Steve.