What Goes with Chicken Wings: 13 Unforgettable Sides

Chicken wings are the perfect pleaser for just about any occasion. You can make them any night of the week for a tasty dinner (especially if your favorite team is playing) or make them the main focus of your party spreads.

These easy, hand-held finger-foods are a win for everyone whether you bake them, fry them, bread them, or serve them with 10 different dipping sauces.

Most people wonder what goes with chicken wings besides raw veggies and French fries though.

Finding the right recipe can be a tough choice, especially when chicken wings can come in all sorts of flavors from hot and spicy to sweet, sticky and Asian-infused.

Once you know what you’re working with, it narrows down your combo choices so you can make this finger-food feast all the more special.

Whether they’re a snack, appetizer, or the main event, what to eat with chicken wings is a topic many folks mull over.

Lucky for you, we’ve already done the mulling so all you need to do is get cooking with your favorite chicken wing recipes.

What to Eat with Chicken Wings: Our Appetizing List

Let’s get our game faces on and check out some chicken wing sides to round out your meal. Don’t forget the napkins…it’s gonna get messy!

1. Avocado Fries with Lime Dipping Sauce

Because we love avocados, avocado fries are at the top of our list. No matter what style you like them, when it comes to what goes with chicken wings, you can’t go wrong with avocado fries.

Yes, we love regular French fries too, but avocado fries give you that good fat to help balance out the chicken wings.

Plus, when you bake or air-fry them, they’re a healthier option.

Serve them with a nice dipping sauce and avocado fries will vanish faster than you can make them, so make a bunch!

We love Gina’s recipe for avocado fries over at Skinny Taste. Her lime dipping sauce is a perfect pairing for a refreshing flavor to go with chicken wings.

2. Broccoli Cheese Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes are a perfect pair for what goes with chicken wings.

Stuffing them though takes the combination to a new level of deliciousness.

Like regular potatoes, there are so many ways to stuff sweet potatoes.

True that you could simply bake them and drop a pat of butter in there and leave it at that, if you really want to go for extra fabulous flavor without a lot of extra work, stuff them. Even better, stuff them with broccoli and cheese.

Especially if you’ve got a medley of different chicken wings you’re adding to your spread, this deliciously nutritious side puts healthy sweet potatoes and broccoli with cheese for a flavor sensation.

See how Sonja and Alex put it together at A Couple Cooks!

3. Crispy Onion Rings

Onion rings are the kind of side dish that even those who profess to hate onions seem to love. Kids that pick out tiny onion bits in your spaghetti sauce will happily gobble these babies up.

When wondering what to serve with chicken wings, you’ll wonder no more when you serve up onion rings.

If you have guests that go meatless, having something that they can enjoy also helps too.

To get them perfectly crispy and make them completely eggless and vegan, watch the magic with this video by The Cooking Foodie.

4. Cauliflower Potato Salad

Potato salad is often a staple side when looking for a good combination with wings.

But plenty of people are keeping low-carb these days. And with chicken wings as the main event, you might want to lighten up your side offerings to balance it out.

That’s where cauliflower comes in to save the day.

It’s a perfect substitute for potatoes and adds a creamy and refreshing balance to even your spiciest wings.

All you need to do to trick your palate (and any kids at the table) is cook the cauliflower to the same softness as you would for the potatoes and you’ve got it made.

Maya over at Wholesome Yum has a truly delightful recipe for cauliflower potato salad that we adore.

5. Baked Mac and Cheese

Ok, look. We know we’ve suggested mac n’ cheese as a side (and even discussed what to make for mac n’ cheese sides when you serve it as a main dish) on here before, but the power of cheese is irresistible.

The rich, velvety textures of cheese are a match made in heaven for most chicken wing recipes.

In a pinch, you can pour it out of the box and have it on the table fast.

The frozen kind is even easier if you don’t want to spend time whipping up your own (although it doesn’t take much longer, really).

6. Cheesy Bacon Stuffed Mini Peppers

When we were dreaming up sides to serve with chicken wings, we thought about jalapeno poppers, the stuff of bar-food dreams.

But when it comes to chicken wings and their pairings, we felt a less-fried, less-breaded approach was necessary (especially if you’re going to make those avocado fries too which you absolutely should!).

Enter: stuffed peppers, mini style! Peppers, bacon, and cheese are an amazing combination.

When you cook peppers, it takes away a bit of the bite so while it matches with a little heat, it’s toned down enough to let your star chicken wings shine.

Ashlyn at Belle of the Kitchen has an outstanding recipe for cheesy bacon stuffed mini peppers that you’re going to love!

7. Loaded Potato Crisps

Yes, we know fries go with chicken wings like Barbie goes with Ken, but we wanted to dream up a different way to do potatoes than simply frying them.

Or pouring out a bag of those frozen fries into the fryer or onto a baking tray.

True that those will do a pinch, why not do something just a little different?

Baked potatoes are another way to go, but if you have kids or are having a party, big baked potatoes might not be the best side for chicken wings.

Instead, try slicing those spuds up, baking them, and then loading them up. If you like potato skins, yep… you’ll love these.

We love the way Jo-Anna does it at A Pretty Life In The Suburbs.

8. Vinegar Based Coleslaw

Coleslaw will always be a tried and true recipe when you’re looking for good companions for a chicken wing dinner or snack.

Not everyone likes it creamy though. And what if you have vegan guests coming?

Plus, if you’re serving wings with an Asian-inspired sauce, it might clash.

One way to get around that and pair well with any style of chicken wings you put on the table is to use a vinegar-based dressing.

It complements any sauce and has a light, crisp, refreshing taste.

Best of all, an excellent recipe is a simple recipe that will leave you feeling so glad you included this one with your spread.

9. Simple, Fresh, and Healthy Garden Salad

Even chicken wings that don’t pack tons of heat can feel heavy on the palate.

One thing to serve with chicken wings is plenty of fresh vegetables and we can’t think of a better way to get them all in nice, crisp, and refreshing than with a simple garden salad.

It’s healthy. It’s delicious.

Oh, and guess what…it’s absolutely easy to do and can even feed a crowd.

Over at Christina’s Cucina, you’ll find a super-simple, super-delicious recipe for garden salad that you can throw together fast!

10. Quick and Easy Nachos

When what to eat with chicken wings is on our mind, we can’t help but think of nachos.

The ultimate party combination, nachos with seasoned meat are just as easy to grab and munch as those chicken wings.

And they’re supremely easy to make.

You can top them with ground beef leftover from last night’s taco fiesta to use up leftovers, use shredded rotisserie chicken, or keep them meatless for a fun side.

Christi at Love From The Oven has one of the easiest, not to mention tastiest, nacho recipes we’ve seen. (Don’t you just want to bite in to her photo?)

11. Crudité Platter

Most of us are accustomed to having celery and carrot sticks with blue cheese to serve with chicken wings.

And while you surely can keep things simple and do the same, why not go bigger and better?

This is especially important if you’re entertaining a crowd.

A crudité platter is the way to go because you can make it your way and serve the veggies you want with the dips you want.

Plate it the right way and everyone will eat their veggies with your chicken wings.

Olivia’s Cuisine gives some amazing and creative suggestions to help you build one your own your way.

12. The Best Easy Italian Pasta Salad

If you’re wondering what can accompany chicken wings that has an Italian flair, a pasta salad makes a superb side.

Pasta salads are ideal for rounding out a meal, whether it’s a regular weekday dinner night or you need a big bowl of something to go on your buffet table for your guests.

It’s summery and refreshing, a nice complement to your Italian-style wings or even your mouth-burning fire-hot wings.

Lindsay at Pinch Of Yum has a marvelous recipe for Italian pasta salad that’s so easy and delicious, you’ve got to taste it to believe it!

13. Asian-Style Brown Rice Salad

And finally, we wanted to include a combo for chicken wings when you make them Asian-style.

Those Asian flavors are sublime, but they can be tricky to pair.

If your favorite way to eat chicken wings is with a sriracha-hoisin-style of sauce, then we’ve got you covered here.

Brown rice is a healthy whole grain and mixed with a medley of vegetables including bok choy, carrots, and peas, it’s got everything you need for a healthy, well-balanced side.

Ingrid at The Cozy Apron has a recipe for the stuff that we’re big fans of.

That orange sesame-soy dressing is heavenly!

The recipe includes chicken but you can omit it for vegetarian or vegan guests, or if you feel that might be too much chicken to serve with chicken wings.

What Goes with Chicken Wings in the Way of Sauces?

We’ve covered some great accompaniments to this tasty chicken dish, but what about how to dress those chicken wings themselves?

Sometimes the sauce you choose to coat your wings with can change what you’ll choose to serve with them, which is why we provided the options we chose to suit just about every scenario.

If you’re just having dinner with the family at home and planning to serve chicken wings, you might not want to go all-out on serving a bunch of different sauces.

But if you’re having a party, it’s loads of fun to create different wing flavors.

Not sure what sauces to do besides the classic buffalo wing sauce, anywhere from mild to outlandishly hot?

Here are some suggestions to take classic wing sauce to the next level:

• Mix in sriracha
• Use a green hot sauce with pickled jalapeños (what you might put with your quesadillas)
• Throw in maple syrup and chipotle
• Go with barbecue sauce instead for sweet and savory flavors
• Brush with apricot preserves mixed with soy sauce or Worcestershire sauce
• Go sweet and sour with sour cherry preserves mixed with lime juice and habanero sauce
• Glaze them with miso, lime juice, fish sauce, and ginger for total umami
• Coat them with almonds instead of breadcrumbs
• Pre-roast them and mix them in a Mediterranean sauce of roasted plum tomatoes with goat cheese and olive oil

Get your island theme on…

• Use Hawaiian inspiration with a sauce of butter, ginger, garlic, pineapple juice, soy sauce, vinegar, and sugar
• If you like jerk chicken flavors, then try some of the same seasoning

Run with some Asian influences…

• Add Asian-flair with an orange-glazed appeal (orange juice, soy sauce, garlic, and brown sugar)
• Use oyster sauce, sake, and dried chilies for a Malaysian flavor
• Try them with Thai-style curry with lemongrass and coconut milk
• Slather them with gochujang paste, a spicy Korean condiment that really kicks

You can also keep them plain and allow for dipping sauces on the side to do all the talking.

There’s really no wrong way to make and enhance your meal with sauces and choices for what goes with chicken wings.

So get cooking with your favorite flavors and get these sides out along with them to make it a special dish you’ll craze forever more!