It’s been a whirlwind 18 months for Trent Weitzel and his humble buffalo wing food truck from Laramie, Wyoming.
Since former University of Wyoming quarterback and current Buffalo Bills superstar Josh Allen mentioned on a national podcast that his favorite spot for chicken wings while at UW was Weitzels Wings, Weitzel and his crew have gained a national reputation.
The Laramie High School grad was featured on the hit Food Network show “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives” in May 2022, won Festival Favorite at last year’s National Buffalo Wing Festival in Buffalo, New York, and set a pair of world records for selling buffalo wings last month.
Despite the distractions of being Wyoming’s undisputed “Wing King,” Weitzel remains laser-focused on what he’s passionate about — buffalo wings.
Back To Buffalo
Now his focus is on repeating as Festival Favorite at this year’s National Buffalo Wing Festival over Labor Day weekend.
To do that, the Double Dub’s team (as its known throughout Wyoming) has to be better and more creative, Weitzel told Cowboy State Daily.
As the defending champ, “I definitely have a target on my back this go-around,” he said. “The first couple of years (at the competition), we were the underdogs, just this little, small place from Wyoming.”
Now the pressure’s on. Which, like Allen, is where Weitzel thrives.
“This last year, year and a half, it’s been good for us,” he said. “But I don’t want to get stagnant or stale, and we’re always trying to do something new and be in the public’s eye. Now we’re going back out to win Festival Favorite again.”
Upping The Game
Weitzel said he’ll take two Double Dub’s food trucks and a crew of about 24 to Buffalo on Sept. 2-3. But it’s the new flavor combinations in the creative categories of the competition that have him most excited.
There’s a Bacon Chili Verde wing in the Creative Spicy category that features a green chili sauce with Hatch green chilis and bacon crumbled on top. The secret to that is the team is going to roast its own fresh Hatch green chilis on site.
“We’re roasting the chilis out there, so people will hear it and see it and will just flock to it,” he said.
He’s also pulling out something special for the barbecue wing. The sauce will be made with a select brand of local high-end maple syrup from Buffalo, New York.
“In my barbecues, we use maple syrup instead of honey, so we’re using that local syrup, and it’s really good,” he said. “It’s a better flavor and you can tell the quality.”
Then there’s the KSS wing, short for Kadyn’s Secret Sauce.
Kadyn is Weitzel’s 12-year-old daughter, who came up with the concept of making a wing that has the flavor of Big Mac Special Sauce.
“That’s my daughter’s invention,” Weitzel said. “She was playing with the sauces and created it, and I thought, ‘Holy cow, that kind of tastes like a Big Mac.’ Then when we put pickles and sesame seeds on it, it really does.”
Still Traditional
It’s all well and good to be creative, and while that always resonates with the huge crowds at the national wing fest, Weitzel said he also has his sights set on winning with his traditional sauces.
In eight trips to the national competition, the Double Dub’s crew has won 17 awards, including first in the traditional medium and extra hot categories, and was close with a second-place finish in traditional hot last year.
“I’ve won the traditional medium category and the extra hot. Now I want to get traditional hot so we can say we’ve won all of those,” he said.
Allen Still Loves Them
While Allen came to the stadium in Buffalo where the contest is held and hung out with Weitzel and the crew for awhile his first year playing for the Buffalo Bills, his fame makes that difficult now, Weitzel said.
“That first year, he came out and hung out at our booth a little bit and helped serve,” he said. “Then COVID happened, and then he’s just become such a superstar that it’s hard to be in a condensed area.”
Now, Allen does come by, but Weitzel will take him some wings so he’s not mobbed by people at the festival.
One thing Allen and Weitzel have in common is a drive to be the best at what they do.
Greg Johnson can be reached at greg@cowboystatedaily.com.
