Hey, y'all! We eat a lot of chicken in our household, like probably an entire farm worth. Some of our favorite recipes are lemon baked chicken, orange chicken and breaded chicken but sometimes, there's nothing like good old fashion barbecue chicken, am I right? The other day, I was getting ready to head outside to fire up the grill with the skies opened up and we suffered a horrific storm. The road leading into our subdivision was flooded, trees were down, it was pretty gnarly.
I was left with no choice, I'd have to bake it off in the oven. Gross, right? Who likes oven baked barbecue chicken? Well, it turns out I do! With a little finagling, I was able to get it to taste just as good as it would have on the grill! And to make things a little better, this recipes only calls for barbecue sauce, chicken breasts, olive oil, salt, and pepper. Yes! It is that simple! These ingredients come together to form a delightfully crispy, sweet, sticky, tender glazed hunk of chicken.
The trick to achieving a thick glaze is to continuously baste your chicken. We're talking like 3 layers of sweet and tangy barbecue sauce! With each magical layer, the sauce thickens and builds on the chicken leaving you with a deliciously crispy skin.
This recipe is perfect for those who don't have a grill, are afraid they'll blow themselves up or for days when you're trapped inside. Are you ready to get started? Oh, and yes... in the south we have cheddar grits with BBQ. It's practically a tradition!
For this recipe I used chicken breasts simply because that's what I had defrosted however, I suggest you use bone-in, skin-on thighs and/or drumsticks for this recipes. The chicken will take a little longer to cook but you'll get an even crispier crust!
Ingredients:
8-10 chicken thighs and/or drum sticks or 1 1/2 pound of chicken breasts
2 cups barbecue sauce
olive oil, salt, and pepper
Directions
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Coat chicken with olive oil, salt and pepper on all sides.
Bake, skin side down, for 25 minutes.
Remove chicken from oven and adjust the oven temperature to 425 degrees.
Coat the top of the chicken with barbecue sauce using a basting brush. Using a spatula, flip the chicken. Baste the other side of the chicken, and place it back in the oven for 7 minutes.
Remove from the oven. Baste the chicken with barbecue sauce and place in the oven for 7 more minutes.
Remove from the oven again and repeat the basting steps. Place back in the oven for 7 more minutes or until the chicken is crispy and is fully cooked.
The chicken was crazy good! The layers and layers of barbecue sauce really stand out to make this dish something special! Again, although I used breasts for this recipe, I typically do it with thighs and drumsticks which give an even crispier texture on the outside.
This is for sure one of my go-to recipes for a rainy evening!