Wings in Washington

50 restaurants in Washington list wings on their menus, and the 40 cheapest are listed above. The cheapest is Rumi’s Kitchen at $6.00, listed as Chicken Wings. The typical price across town is $12.95, and the dearest of the 40 listed is $17.99 at Old Ebbitt Grill, so the two ends of the list are $11.99 apart, which is 200% more for the same dish. Of the 40 kitchens listed, 20 charge more than a dollar under the typical price, 8 sit within a dollar of it and 12 charge more than a dollar over.

We track wings in 973 other areas and compare them all on wings across United States. The typical price there runs $12.95 at the median, so Washington is about average, with a lower typical price than 486 of the 973. The lowest best price anywhere we cover is $4.25 at Uno Pizza in Philadelphia, PA, and the highest best price is $17.55 in Paramus, NJ. The nearest area with it is Silver Spring, about 7 mi away, where the best price is $8.99.

Where is the cheapest wings in Washington? Rumi’s Kitchen, at $6.00 on 640 L Street Northwest. The same dish reaches $17.99 elsewhere in town, so where you order it changes the bill by $11.99.

What should wings cost here? About $12.95 is the typical price across the 50 kitchens in Washington that list it. Of the ones listed above, 20 are more than a dollar below that and 12 are more than a dollar above, so the typical price is a middle rather than a floor.

Is it cheaper nearby? The nearest area we track it in is Silver Spring, about 7 mi away, where the best price is $8.99. That is $2.99 more than the best price here.

Why do the prices differ so much? We compare what each menu calls the same dish, and menus are not identical: portion, cut, sides and the kind of room you are sitting in all ride on the price, and none of that shows up in a number. Part portions and half sizes are kept out of this comparison, and a chain charging the same at several addresses is counted once, so the spread above is between genuinely different kitchens rather than the same one repeated.