This is a dish that both kids and adults like as much. Pulled chicken is delicious, tender and perfect to eat in a sandwich or just on a plate with a nice side dish. Bbq sauce lovers love love loooove this recipe and with that green apple coleslaw, it becomes even better.
For the pulled chicken I used my home-made bbq sauce that’s really easy to make. The main ingredients are ketchup, vinegar and a bit of brown sugar. You cook it up and you get bbq sauce. Ideally, also add the paprika and cumin that I use, but if you don’t have those ingredients you’ll do fine with the basics. Alternatively, you can also use store-bought bbq sauce.
I love coleslaw. I cannot explain to you how much I like this sandwich! My recipe for coleslaw salad I’ve used before in my Korean-BBQ inspired tacos (I really recommend that recipe BTW) and in a juicy lucy burger (burger filled with cheese). In this occasion, I also added a green apple to it because it becomes so much brighter with it. If you don’t have an apple you can ignore it. If you don’t have cabbage but you do have a hard lettuce such as iceberg or romaine you can use that instead. What you do in that case is mix the sauce on the side and let it rest to dissolve the sugar for 15 minutes. If you’re using carrots and apples you can also let them rest with the sauce. Then you mix it with the lettuce right before serving because it has more water than cabbage.
Javier and I had the pulled pork in a sandwich as you see in the photos. It’s best if you get your hands on a slightly sweet bread like Hawaiian bread or Brioche. If you don’t get a grab of one of those, though, go ahead and use whatever bread you have at home. Alternatively, you can serve the chicken along with just the salad, another salad, mashed potatoes or rice.
Ingredients
Para la salsa bbq
- 250 g ketchup
- 60 ml apple cider vinegar
- 1 tsp brown sugar
- ½ tsp paprika
- ½ tsp ground cumin
- ⅙ tsp cinnamon
For the chicken
- 4 chicken thighs or 2 chicken breasts
- Salt and pepper
For the coleslaw
- 70 g carrots julienned
- 50 g purple cabbage thinly sliced
- 50 g green cabbage thinly sliced
- 1 green apples julienned
- 100 g mayonnaise it can be a light kind
- 1 tbsp granulated sugar
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
Instructions
For the bbq sauce
- Place everything in a pot and let it boil for about 15min or until it thickens and turns deeper in colour. You can keep it for up to a week in the fridge or for up to 3 months in the freezer.
For the chicken
- Remove the skin from the chicken and season it with salt and pepper on both sides.
- Mix the chicken pieces with bbq sauce. if you don't want to make the bbq sauce yourself you're going to need 12 tbsp of store-bought bbq sauce.
- Roast the chicken in a preheated oven at 180°C/350°F for 40 minutes. It doesn't matter if it's not completely cooked at this stage.
- Remove the chicken from the oven. Remove the bones and shred the meat.
- You will notice that the chicken has let go of liquids and mixed with the bbq sauce. Place the shredded chicken along with the juices and bbq sauce in a small pot and cook them over medium-low heat (important to keep the chicken soft) until it thickens.
For the coleslaw
- Mix all the ingredients and let them rest for at least 15 minutes. This resting time will make the sugar dissolve and soften the cabbage.
To serve
- I served my pulled chicken as a sandwich with hawaiian bread. First I toasted the bread on both sides with butter in a pan. However, you can serve the pulled chicken just on a dish with other sidedishes or the coleslaw, too.
