Saucy Barbecue Chicken Bites
These Saucy Barbecue Chicken Bites are super flavorful, protein-packed, and easy to make, with no grill required! If you’re craving barbecue chicken, these come together in just about 20 minutes and are sure to hit the spot. I have quite a number of chicken bites recipes on my site now, but after becoming obsessed with my Spicy Buffalo Chicken Bites, I wanted to make another saucy variety. I’m happy to say I love this barbecue version just as much! The sauce thickens while cooking with the seasoned chicken bites and the result, in my opinion, is perfection.
Not only are these Saucy Barbecue Chicken Bites quick and easy to make, but a satisfying (3.65 ounce) serving is just 172 calories, 25 grams of protein, or 2 WW Points on the Weight Watchers program. To view your current WW Points for this recipe and track it in the WW app, click here!
Barbecue Seasoning Mix
If you’ve made my Barbecue Rubbed Chicken Bites before you’ll recognize the seasoning blend. For this saucy version, I add a tablespoon of flour to the seasoning mix. It helps thicken the barbecue sauce once you add it to the cooked chicken. Don’t be intimidated to make your own seasoning blend! It’s easy and only takes a few minutes. If you cook fairly often, you most likely have most of these seasonings on hand already. The only ones you may need to buy are:
- dry mustard – a fine powder, like Colman’s in the yellow can, also great to add flavor to homemade mac and cheese
- celery salt – I use this to make homemade chex mix at the holidays, so I always have it!
I’m guessing most well-stocked kitchens will have the other ingredients you’ll need: flour, salt, black pepper, paprika, brown sugar, garlic powder, onion powder, chili powder, and allspice. All you’ll have to do to make this seasoning mix is measure out the spices and stir them together!
How to Serve
These Saucy Barbecue Chicken Bites are great on their own and pair well with all types of side dishes. They’d also be great for meal prep! I pictured them here with raw veggies and a veggie dip that’s just a tablespoon of French Onion Dip with a bit of Buffalo sauce stirred in for a kick. It made the perfect lunch! They’re also great served for dinner with roasted vegetables and seasoned rice (my daughter loves rice-a-roni), as part of a veggie and grain bowl, on top of a salad, or in a wrap. This recipe is so versatile!
Cutting up the chicken
I often buy a big pack of boneless, skinless chicken breasts at the store and then use kitchen shears to trim them down to make 5-6 oz cutlets to use in recipes. Everything I cut off to make the cutlets gets cut into chunks to make chicken bites! It’s easy to weigh out 1 lb or 1.5 lb of chicken chunks and freeze them for later in a quart size freezer bag. That way, I always have some on hand! Buying the bulk packs of chicken breasts is cost-effective, and cutting them into cutlets and bites ensured I have what I need on hand when I go to make a recipe. I find that kitchen shears make this task go quicker and easier than using a knife, so I highly recommend using shears like these (affiliate link).
More Tasty Chicken Bite Flavors
Looking for more tasty flavors of chicken bites? Check out my Spicy Buffalo Chicken Bites, Blackened Chicken Bites, Barbecue Rubbed Chicken Bites, Nashville Hot Chicken Bites, Pickle Brined Chicken Bites, Sticky Honey Coriander Chicken Bites, Lemon Pepper Chicken Bites, Everything Seasoned Chicken Bites, Greek Chicken Bites, Mexi Chicken Bites, and more in the Chicken Bites category of my recipe index!
Saucy Barbecue Chicken Bites
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons paprika
- 1 teaspoon packed brown sugar
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ½ teaspoon onion powder
- ½ teaspoon chili powder
- ½ teaspoon dry mustard powder
- ½ teaspoon celery salt
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- ¼ teaspoon ground allspice
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 lb boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into small bite-sized pieces
- 3 tablespoons barbecue sauce, (I use and recommend Stubbs Original)
Instructions
- In a small dish, stir together all the seasonings: flour, paprika, brown sugar, salt, garlic powder, onion powder, chili powder, dry mustard, celery salt, black pepper, and allspice.
- Place the chicken pieces into a mixing bowl. Add the seasoning mix to the chicken pieces. Stir the contents of the bowl until the chicken pieces are coated with the flour and spices.
- Add the oil to a large sauté pan/walled skillet and bring over med-high heat. Once the oil is hot, add the chicken pieces (don’t overcrowd the pan) and stir to break them up and coat them in the oil. Cook the chicken for 6-7 minutes, stirring every couple minutes. Once the chicken is cooked, reduce the heat to low and drizzle the barbecue sauce over the chicken. Stir to coat the chicken in the sauce and cook on low for another 1-2 minutes, stirring halfway through until sauce has thickened.
Notes
172 calories, 7 g carbs, 3 g sugars, 7 g fat, 1 g saturated fat, 25 g protein, 1 g fiber, 234 mg sodium (from myfitnesspal.com) Weight Watchers Points Plus:
5 per (3.65 ounce) serving (PP calculated using a Weight Watchers PointsPlus calculator and the nutrition info)
