This recipe includes pre-cooking your chicken before placing it under the broiler to get that bbq char effect. And it even includes making your own barbeque sauce from scratch!

We all love barbeque chicken, but sometimes it’s just too much hassle to fire up the grill. For this recipe, I pre-cook the chicken (in Trinidad we call it “steaming”) before tossing it under the broiler to get that nice bbq char on the outside. I used chicken thighs only, but you can use thighs and legs once it’s about the same weight.

I love making this for a Sunday lunch or evening a quick midweek meal. My usual way of making this starts off with a store-bought smokey bbq sauce as the base, and I spruce it up with some seasonings and spices. So on this particular Sunday, I decided to make oven barbeque thighs, but little did I know that I was all out of my Kraft’s hickory smoke bbq sauce. By the time I realized, I had already started cooking my chicken on the stove. I started to think quickly!….. and came up with this homemade version. Like most of my savoury recipes, you can play around with the flavours and add whatever suits your taste. I like to add liquid smoke, honey instead of sugar, and even some hot peppers to give it a spicy kick. So go ahead….have some fun with it!

Tips For Making This Chicken:

You can use any cut of chicken you like, just make sure you have equivalent weight. I prefer thighs because it’s somehow juicier, but I have also tried it with legs and it came out great.
When seasoning the chicken, if you decide to leave out the bouillon cubes, just compensate with a little more salt.
When making the bbq sauce, you are looking to get a consistency of ketchup or store-bought bbq sauce so that it will cling to the chicken.
Treat the bbq sauce recipe as a blank canvas, and jazz it up however you like. If you prefer a tangy sauce, then use less sugar, if you like it sweet, then throw in some more. Play around with it and make it your own. Sometimes I throw in some fresh thyme, pimentoes, hot peppers…anything ;). Btw, any remaining bbq sauce can be stored in the fridge to be used at a later time.
When it comes to broiling, you have to stay close and keep an eye on your chicken every minute if you have to. This is because everyone’s broiler operates differently depending on how far your tray is from the flame, so you really need to keep an eye on it, otherwise, it will burn!

Ingredients

For Chicken:

14 bone-in, skin-on thighs- about 5 pounds

4 tablespoons thick green seasoning- I used pureed bhandania/chadon beni. You can use whichever is your favourite.

2 chicken bouillon cubes

3 tablespoons minced garlic

1 teaspoon salt

For the Barbeque sauce:

2 cups ketchup

½ tablespoon molasses

1 tablespoon minced garlic

1 tablespoon grated onion

1 tablespoon fresh green seasoning – minced bhandania or any other you prefer

1 ½ cups water

5 teaspoons brown sugar

1 ½ teaspoon salt

Method:

Clean and wash the chicken according to your normal method for bbq-ing; for me I like to leave the skin on to get crispy. Season the chicken with all ingredients and add to a pot on medium low heat. Cover and allow it to render its own liquid. Remove the cover and continue cooking while turning every 5 minutes or so. When the liquid has reduced completely, and the chicken has cooked through, remove from heat and set aside.

While the chicken is cooking you can make the sauce. Add all ingredients to a pot and allow it to reduce to about 3/4 on a medium low heat. The consistency should be similar to store-bought barbeque sauce- thick enough to coat the chicken pieces.

Preheat your broiler to high (about 500 degF). Place the chicken pieces, skin side down in an oven proof dish and brush with the bbq sauce. Broil for about 3-5 minutes until slightly charred. Flip the pieces of chicken and brush with more sauce. Broil for about 3 minutes, and brush again. Broil for a further 5-8 minutes until the skin is charred, but not burnt. Remember to check your chicken after each minute.