Pat the wings very dry with paper towels. Toss with the fine sea salt, garlic powder, onion powder, white pepper, and neutral oil until evenly coated. For the best skin, place the wings uncovered on a wire rack in the refrigerator for 2–12 hours. This dries the surface and gives the seasoning time to penetrate. Wet wings are trash on the grill. They steam first, brown late, and never get the crisp skin this recipe needs. Leaving the wings uncovered on a rack rather than sitting directly on a tray lets air circulate on all sides, drawing surface moisture away steadily over the extended chilling window — that dry surface is exactly what the grill's heat needs to go straight into rendering and crisping rather than first evaporating moisture.

In a bowl, combine the finely grated Pecorino, Parmesan, egg yolks, and coarsely cracked black pepper. Mix into a thick paste. Do not use pre-grated cheese. It does not melt cleanly and can turn the sauce grainy. Pre-grated, packaged cheese is typically coated with anti-caking agents that interfere with smooth melting — freshly, finely grated cheese blends into the hot liquid cleanly, while pre-grated cheese tends to clump and produce a grainy, broken-looking sauce.

Preheat the grill for two-zone cooking: one low indirect-heat area and one hotter direct-heat area. Aim for about 150–165°C on the indirect side. The point is to cook the wings slowly enough that the fat renders before the outside burns. This moderate indirect zone gives the wing's substantial fat content, particularly around the drums and flats, real time to render out slowly — going straight to high heat would char the skin before that fat has had a chance to properly melt away.

Place the wings over indirect heat. Close the lid and cook for 30–40 minutes, turning every 10 minutes, until the fat has rendered, the skin looks tighter, and the wings are cooked through. The wings should reach at least 74°C internally, but they eat better around 82–88°C because the connective tissue softens and the meat pulls cleanly from the bone. Pushing well past the minimum safe temperature is specifically worthwhile for wings, since their connective tissue behaves similarly to a larger cut like a shoulder — extra time and heat beyond the bare minimum continues softening that tissue, producing meat that pulls away from the bone far more easily than wings pulled at just-safe temperature.

Move the wings over direct heat and grill for 5–10 minutes, turning often, until the skin is crisp with visible char marks. Do not walk away here. Rendered wings go from beautifully charred to burnt fast. Once the fat has fully rendered during the slow stage, the skin has very little remaining moisture or fat left to protect it from scorching — this final direct-heat stage moves quickly, and the margin between properly charred and burnt is genuinely narrow.

While the wings finish, melt the butter in a small saucepan over low heat. Add the cracked black pepper and bloom it for 30–45 seconds until fragrant. Remove the pan from direct heat. Slowly whisk 90ml hot chicken stock, hot water, or hot wing resting juices into the cheese-yolk mixture, a little at a time, until it loosens into a creamy sauce. Whisk in the peppered butter. The sauce should be creamy, pale, glossy, and thick enough to coat the wings. Add the remaining liquid only if needed. Do not boil the sauce. High heat will scramble the egg yolk and split the cheese. That would ruin the whole thing. Blooming the pepper briefly in melted butter releases its aromatic oils directly into the fat, producing a noticeably more fragrant, rounded pepper flavour than simply stirring raw cracked pepper into the finished sauce would.

Place the hot wings in a large bowl. Let them cool for 1–2 minutes so they are still hot but not violently steaming. Pour over the cacio e pepe sauce and toss until every wing is coated. The residual heat from the wings should warm and cling the sauce without breaking it. This brief cooling window matters more than it might seem — tossing the sauce with wings that are still violently steaming risks that trapped heat and moisture working against the delicate egg-and-cheese emulsion, while wings that are merely hot warm and loosen the sauce just enough to cling evenly.

Pile the wings onto a plate. Sprinkle heavily with extra finely grated Pecorino and more coarsely cracked black pepper. Serve immediately while the wings are hot, the skin is still crisp underneath the sauce, and the cheese coating is glossy. The crisp skin beneath the sauce begins softening the moment the sauce sits against it, so serving without delay is what preserves the contrast between the crackling skin and the creamy coating over it.