Your whole family will love these Barbecue Baked Chicken Drumsticks! The chicken is coated in sticky sweet barbecue sauce and is super tender and fall off the bone delicious.
Chicken drumsticks are an easy go-to for busy families. Kids love that they are hand-hand and easy to eat, and what kid doesn’t love barbecue sauce? Moms love that they are crazy easy to cook. Just season, bake, sit, and you’re good to go! These are the perfect start to an easy, kid-friendly meal.
How to Make Barbecue Baked Chicken Drumsticks
Baking chicken drumsticks is pretty simple. All you need is a few ingredients, some seasoning, and a nice deep baking dish.
- First, decide whether you want skin on, or skin off. Personally with this recipe, we are strictly skin off kind of people. But if you want to broil the chicken for a bit, you should be able to get it to crisp up a bit.
- Removing the skin is the most time consuming part of this whole recipe, and it may take all of 7 minutes. Don’t stress about getting every little bit, just get as much as you can.
- Next lay out the chicken in a large baking dish. I do recommend lining the pan with foil as the barbecue sauce will bake onto the dish. This recipe makes about 10-12 drumsticks and depending on the dish you use they may or may not all fit. But you can easily just use two smaller dishes. Season the drumsticks with salt and pepper. It will take about 40 minutes to cook them all the way through, brushing them with sauce a few times, then at the end flip on the broil to get that lovely caramelization on the top.
- Finally tent the whole pan with foil and let the drumsticks cool a bit. The bone especially gets quite hot, so biting into one straight out of the oven could be painful.
We love to serve these Barbecue Baked Chicken Drumsticks with easy side dishes like Broccoli Slaw, Cauliflower Mac & Cheese or Instant Pot Mashed Potatoes.
If you’re looking for more easy chicken drumsticks recipes, look no further than these:
- Baked Honey Mustard Chicken Drumsticks
- Easy Oven Baked Chicken Drumsticks
- Lemon Garlic Roasted Chicken Drumsticks
- Slow Cooker Asian Chicken Drumsticks
Barbecue Baked Chicken Drumsticks
Ingredients
- 10-12 chicken drumsticks skinless
- 1 cup of your favorites barbecue sauce
- Salt & pepper
- Fresh minced parsley optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
- Remove skin from chicken and pat dry. *Note, you can also cook with the skin on and crisp it under the broiler. You can also use thighs or breasts but you may need to adjust the cooking time.
- Spray a 13x9-inch baking dish generously with nonstick cooking spray and arrange chicken in it; close together but not completely touching (you may need to use two pans, depending on the size of your drumsticks - you just need to use a deep pan, not a baking sheet). Season both sides of the chicken with salt and pepper.
- Slide the pan into the oven uncovered, and roast for 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and brush barbecue sauce onto the chicken. Roast for an additional 15 minutes and brush again with the sauce.
- Brush chicken one last time, then turn on the broiler and broil chicken for several minutes to help caramelize the sauce; about 4-5 minutes, watching closely to avoid burning. If using skin-on chicken this will also help to crisp the skin.
- Remove from the oven and tent with foil. Let stand 10 minutes before serving. Garnish with fresh minced parsley if desired.
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