By Elaine Van Develde

Sometimes it’s just a good idea to wing it.

Usually, chicken wings are pretty standard fare — a spicy, typically sopping morsel of an appetizer. There are usually standard variations, too: baked, fried, baked and fried, grilled and usually laden with a some sort of spicy sauce.

Then there are the salt and pepper wings served up at Gaslight in Atlantic Highlands. They’re crispy fried, not dried out, not breaded, salted and peppered wings served with a wedge of lime and two sauces. There’s a Korean barbecue sauce and a tangy hot sauce. They’re served on the side so the wings keep their crunch and flavor complementing is done at the diner’s desire, our waitress told us.

A sprinkling of the lime and a touch of either sauce is all that’s needed. And dip or drizzle switching is a tasty option that doesn’t leave you in a sloppy dining mess.

Yeah, they’re just wings, but, hey they’re tempting and tidy enough to talk about.  Wings are just one of those dishes for picking and we pick this one.

The place has ambience, too.

No, it’s certainly not just about wings at Gaslight, which, by the way, intentionally has no sign, rather a gaslight outside which, when lit, means the place is open.

The relatively new gastropub on First Avenue that’s known to carry a host of craft beers also has some food that one could pretty much call palate art — like sushi pizza, chicken and waffles, homemade sausage with broccoli rabe and pasta, roasted oysters …

We could go on — drooling over unique menu items people have been talking about — but those are for another day, one at a time, even if it takes a while. Hey, ya gotta do what ya gotta do for the sake of some foodie fun.

Gaslight in its verbal form means to be manipulated to the point at which one questions his or her own sanity.

Well, the food there does manipulate the senses — to an insatiable sort of food insanity. More. You just want more. The chicken wings whet the appetite and the menu calls you back — for sushi pizza or chicken and waffles next time at this great little local niche over the bridge.