Pulled Chicken Sliders

I’ve been known to skip out on super bowl parties to instead enjoy a quiet night by myself. I know, crazy sounding for a native New Englander where everyone lives and breaths all things Patriots and Red Sox! This year I got into the spirit, which for me means making a big batch of pulled chicken to share with everyone. I originally found this recipe years ago, and have perfected my own crock pot version that anyone can conquer…

What You Need:

• 4-5 lbs boneless chicken breasts
• 4 granny smith apples
• 8 slices low sodium turkey bacon
• 1 large onion
• Your favorite BBQ sauce — I like Trader Joe’s  (about 19 ounces)
• Mini slider buns

What You Do:

1) Trim any fat from the chicken breasts, then throw the chicken breasts in the crock pot.

2) Chop the bacon. I do this by stacking the slices and cutting 3-4 times length wise, then chop the shorter way into small pieces.

3) Peel the apples and roughly dice. Roughly dice the onion too.

4) Add the diced apples, onion and bacon to the crock pot. Then, pour in all of the BBQ sauce and mix everything up.

5) Turn the crock pot to low and cook for 6-7 hours. High will work as well for 3-4 hours.

6) After 6-7 hours, remove the chicken breasts and pull apart with a fork. The chicken should be very tender, pulling apart easily.

7) From cooking, the juices from the chicken may result in more sauce than what you started with. Rather than add the chicken back into the crock pot with ALL the sauce, I like to mix the pulled chicken in a bowl, adding sauce until I have the balance I like. I pour the remaining sauce in a bowl so people can add more to their serving if they like. Throw the pulled chicken back into the crock pot at the “warm” setting for self serve. If you feel you don’t have enough sauce, just add more during this process.

8) Serve — great on it’s own and perfect with some mini slider buns too.