Chicken Drumsticks

This chicken has the best skin: It's nicely spiced and super-crispy. The cilantro relish served alongside gets vibrant flavor from white vinegar.

This satisfying riff on smothered pork chops calls for skinless chicken drumsticks, which have only slightly more fat than breasts, as well as more zinc and iron and tons more flavor.

Instead of making a traditional American barbecue sauce, Grace Parisi prepares a sweet, sticky, slightly fiery version using Asian ingredients, like chile sauce, hoisin sauce, rice vinegar and ginger.

Pureeing garlic, onion and cilantro, then cooking them with white mushrooms in chicken fat, gives this tomato-based sauce an incredible depth of flavor.

This is Chris Yeo's riff on kung pao, a Szechuan dish made with stir-fried diced chicken and chiles; he uses the cooked chiles as the base for the rich dipping sauce.

Grace Parisi prepares a wonderfully sticky and nicely sweet glaze of fresh plums and red pepper jelly to brush over drumsticks while grilling. Hot red pepper jelly makes for a spicier glaze; sweet pepper jelly creates a milder one.

Chilaquiles is a baked Mexican dish that’s often made with leftover shredded chicken, tortilla strips and cheese. In her more substantial and refined version, Grace Parisi bakes whole chicken legs with tomatoes, hominy, jalapeños and tortilla chips.

These smoky grilled chicken legs get a boost of flavor from a marinade made with brown sugar, mustard, coriander and jalapeño.

Melissa Clark’s favorite part of the chicken is the drumstick, because it’s juicy and easy to brown. She likes using only drumsticks in this mustardy stew—thickened with tangy crème fraîche—so that all the meat cooks at the same rate.

Skinless chicken legs have only slightly more fat than breasts and are much tastier, especially when marinated in spicy yogurt, as they are here. Chaat masala—a spice blend with an intriguing tang from green mango powder—makes this northern-Indian dish extra-delicious. Try it sprinkled over chickpeas or popcorn.