Healthy, Quick and Easy Air Fryer BBQ Chicken Thighs

Air fryer BBQ chicken thighs is the perfect way to get that crispy skin and grilled taste leaving your mouth watering for more!!

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Who doesn’t love BBQ chicken but tend to shy away from the sticky BBQ sauce because its deemed as unhealthy as are most condiments we all love.

What if I told you there is a way you can still enjoy this perfect summertime food and fit your macros and meet your health goals, win right?!

This is an easy weeknight dinner that will have you spending less time in the kitchen and more time with the fam.

Made in the air fryer and cooked to crisp perfect EVERY SINGLE TIME. I love the air fryer invention, I literally use it multiple times a week because it makes everything tastes so dang delicious.

If you are in the market for one, the one I have and use is linked here. We love it because its large and has the different features and 2 separate cooking trays for even faster cooking.

Simple Ingredients needed for this air fryer BBQ chicken thighs meal:

What I love about this dish is how easy it is to throw together. For the simple seasoning blend, you can use whatever you have you hand. Here’s what I like to use for this recipe:

• Garlic Powder
• Onion Powder
• Paprika
• Salt and Pepper to taste
• Favorite Store-bought BBQ sauce, but I recommend Stubb’s BBQ sauce for macro friendly
• Skinless boneless chicken thighs

Please Note: There are different cuts of chicken such as breasts, bone-in chicken thighs, chicken legs. However, for this recipe and best results using the directions I have provided, we are using skinless boneless chicken thighs. If you have a different cut or variation, please adjust your cooking times so that the internal temperature of the chicken reaches 165 degrees or 175 degrees depending on which cut you are using.

How to make Air Fryer BBQ Chicken Thighs

Step 1

Preheat your air fryer to 380 degrees, spray your air fryer pan with non-stick spray and pop chicken thighs in for 8 minutes, make sure everything is in a single layer.

Step 2

Then smother it in BBQ sauce using a pastry brush, cook for another 4 minutes

Step 3

After the first 4 minutes with BBQ sauce, flip the chicken and smother again with BBQ sauce using the pastry brush and cook for another 4 minutes

Step 4

BOOM! Finished. Nothing like short and sweet for these amazing air fryer chicken thighs and the best part is how quick the prep time and cooking process is.

Some of my recommendations to help meet your macro goals when making these boneless skinless chicken thighs:

BBQ SAUCE

You can use your favorite barbeque sauce for this recipe, personally I absolutely love sweet baby ray, and I feel like that is just a favorite across the board.

However, it is jammed packed with over 16g of sugar per serving.

The nice thing about this day and age is there is a healthy alternative for almost anything.

This recipe uses our family’s favorite healthy alternative, Stubb’s original BBQ sauce which has only 5g of sugar per serving.

LOWER FAT

If you are looking for lower fat content, make sure to choose a skinless chicken thigh for this main dish.

The skin-on chicken thighs is always delicious, but is nothing but fat.

It’s always the good stuff!!! Don’t worry, here at YummyMacroLife, my personal goal is to bring you recipes you will love so you can still indulge.

We love juicy chicken thighs because it has a different flavor than chicken breast, and my family loves the darker meat.

However, they do tend to be fattier so just make sure you are trimming off any excess fat before cooking.

Side Dish Staples for Healthy Side Ideas:

Having trouble deciding what to make with these delicious BBQ chicken thighs that air on the side of healthier??

Here’s what I usually gravitate towards that you can throw together pretty quickly and requires minimum effort:

• Roasted Potatoes
• Corn on the cob
• Sweet Potatoes
• Garden Salad
• Asparagus
• Green Beans
• Roasted or Sauteed Veggies of any kind (ex: broccoli, squash, zucchini)
• Tomato cucumber salad

How to store the leftovers:

Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. To reheat, cover the dish with a paper towel and reheat in the microwave.

You can find this recipe and others by Yummymacrolife.com already preloaded on My Fitness Pal.

Simply search Yummymacrolife – Air fryer BBQ Chicken Thighs