Review: Popeyes $5 Boneless Wing Bash (New/Limited Time Only)

As we have said in past articles, chicken wings are a big thing. And they have been for years. Why buy whole pieces of chicken when you can gnaw on little bitty wings? Makes sense, right??

If it makes sense or not is really irrelevant. They are popular, and sell by the ton. We wish we would have thought of selling small wings and made a fortune. We would have more money for beer, and wouldn’t have to be writing these articles all day! Um…we mean…we like writing articles all day for you, our dear readers!

Anyway, wings are a Fewd Snob food. If you have been around our site for a while, you see where this is going.

We discovered the new $5 Boneless Wing Bash at Popeyes by accident. We were hunting around for something to review, and came across it on Popeyes’ website. We had no idea this deal was going on. We haven’t seen any ads, or heard anything about it. After some hunting, we discovered this deal was introduced at the beginning of July. It will be around until the end of the month. So, we give you a 12 day old review! Hey, there’s still over a half of month left. Nobody ever accused us of being quick. Meh.

The $5 Boneless Wing Bash includes 6 boneless wings, a regular side, biscuit, and dipping sauce. For our test, we got fries for the side since that is what is shown in the promo pics. A bunch of different dipping sauces are available, but there are no new ones for these wings. We chose ranch. Pretty original and exciting, eh? That’s us! OK, maybe not. But anyway…

Our Popeyes test location is always an adventure. This has got to be the slowest location in the nation. And this location must have the dumbest employees ever. Seriously, these are the morons that forgot our sauce with a meal that features the sauce. The woman at the counter was only able to take one order at a time. Then, she would disappear for five minutes, come back with the order, and then take another order. Rinse and repeat. And this was at lunch time. Kill us. Hell, there was a guy standing in line behind us that just left. Can’t blame the guy.

We figure they were killing the chickens in the back, cleaning ’em up, and then cooking them. In the time we could have hunted our own chickens, we finally got our food…

Fries, biscuit, and wings. You didn’t expect a Big Mac, did you??

Herman expertly arranged and photographed the wings as you see above. Yes, we said photographed.

A couple of the wings were huge. A few were decent sized. Then, you can see the little squib that we got there. Does that even count as one of the six wings? Why yes, yes it does. Jeebus.

Here, you can get a good look at the chicken. It is all white meat. There is a decent amount of breading which is pretty typical of Popeyes.

We were wondering if these wings would be spicy or not. Popeyes has regular and spicy chicken. Yet, there is no option when ordering the wings. Upon tearing open another wing, we saw this…

There is some of the classic Popeyes orange spice in some of the wings. Enthralling.

If you are reading this, you have probably eaten at Popeyes before. The fries are typical Popeyes fries. They are a little spicy, and never crispy. They are good though. The biscuit is good too, despite a little too much fake butter stuff on them. We like the sides. No point in wasting much time here.

On to the wings, shall we?

Well, before we do that, let’s talk about boneless wings. What the hell is a boneless wing, anyway? Regular wings are at least wings, even if they are smaller than a standard chicken wing. In contrast, a boneless “wing” isn’t a wing at all. In reality, a boneless wing is just a piece of breast meat (or a tender) that is breaded and fried. There is really nothing “wing” about them. Take a tender, cut it in three pieces, bread it, and fry it. There you have it.

Yet, people go batshit crazy over them. Buffalo Wild Wings has made loads of money selling boneless “wings” to idiots all over the country that are too delicate to gnaw on some chicken bones. So why not jump on, Popeyes?

The thing that makes boneless wings seem more like real wings at places like B-Dubs is that the chicken is spun in wing sauce. These Popeyes boneless wings are not. With no sauce, the chicken truly resembles cut up tenders. There really is nothing to make you feel like you are eating boneless wings.

Now, having said all that, these “wings” are actually very good. The chicken is very tender and juicy. The breading has a good flavor, even if the flavor is slight. There is just a hint of spice which is surely due to the orange stuff you see in the shot above. There is certainly more spice than Popeyes’ plain chicken. But, there is nowhere near the heat of the spicy chicken. The breading has a nice crunch to it.

The bottom line is that the chicken is good. Call them wings, tender pieces, or call them whatever you want. It is good, and that’s what is most important.

You can accent the chicken with the dipping sauce of your choice. Check out the sauces here, because we are too lazy to type all that. We decided on ranch for our test sauce. Because we like ranch. Good enough.

The Popeyes geniuses gave us two sauces. Take a good look…

One of the packages of sauce was crushed. OK. But it was also open, and oozing nasty, congealed, probably food poisoned old ranch dripping all over the outside and on to the other package of sauce that was not open. Take a good look at the left side of the crushed package there. Are you telling us that the idiot employee didn’t notice this when putting it in the bag? Really? What would even make someone think to give a customer a package of sauce in this condition? And these people want 15 bucks an hour??

The ranch is a buttermilk ranch, and you can taste the buttermilk. It is more runny than thick, which we don’t mind. It is good, but pretty standard stuff. It created a good flavor when mixed with the chicken. For more kick, try Popeyes’ version of buffalo sauce. Evidently, it has a Cajun twist. Go figure.

This deal is 5 bucks, so there is certainly value here. Six wings, a biscuit, and a side will fill you up. And for 5 bucks, why not? Having said that though, isn’t it Popeyes that frequently has the 3 piece chicken tenders with a side and a biscuit for $2.99?? Amazing! Call them tenders and the price is cheaper! Call them wings, and raise the price! Stands to reason, because wings are always expensive. If you like a lot of breading, then you will like the wings more than the 3 tenders because there are six pieces coated with the crispy breading. But is that worth 2 bucks more? Only you can judge that one.

Popeyes is using the term “boneless wings” to drive sales here, people. It is as simple as that. But, the food is good. And there is a decent amount for 5 bucks. In an age where 5 bucks typically can’t buy you lunch at a fast food place, we think this is a pretty good deal all around. When compared to other places, it is a good value. But, compared to other Popeyes offers, it is hard to say.

Overall, we liked this meal. We probably wouldn’t bother with it again, though. Right now, Popeyes is offering 5 pieces of legs and thighs for 5 bucks. We’ll stick with that. You can have the “wings.”