crispy chicken fingers

These little things are so good.  We eat a lot of baked chicken and grilled chicken with veggies and on salads.  But one night I was craving CRUNCHY chicken.  Like fried chicken, but healthy.  I can't handle grease anymore, and of course it needed to be gluten free.  So I came up with these little fingers and they were so delectable when paired with the Nature's Hollow BBQ Sauce.

They ARE dry without sauce, because of the coating, (inside they are super juicy though!) so you will want a good dipping sauce whether it be a paleo BBQ sauce, honey mustard or ketchup. 

I did a review of the sauce here. And you can buy it online.  Sprout's use to carry it, and still carries the ketchup at some locations, but I can only find the BBQ sauce through their website now.   Read on for the recipe. 

P.S. mine got a little crispy, because it was my first attempt, and I left them in a little long. I have adjusted the recipe below.  Also, the crackers I used DO contain egg, but you could use a gluten-free cracker without to make these also egg-free. 

Ingredients:
1 C. Gluten Free BBQ Sauce (I use Nature's Hollow) (divided)
1/2 C. Honey (divided)
1-2 Lbs. Free-Range Organic Chicken Tenders
Olive Oil or Coconut Oil Cooking Spray
2 Cups Gluten-Free Crackers (I used Yahuda's Gluten-Free Matza)


Directions: 
Mix 1/2 c. BBQ Sauce and 1/4 honey to create marinade and put in low dish or ziploc bag.  Add chicken tenders and shake or mix well.  Put in fridge for 1 to 4 hours.  

Take a box of Yahuda's gluten free matza crackers or something similar and crush until you have fine crumbs.  Pour into a bowl and cover chicken tenders until coated completely. (the marinade will allow the cracker crumbs to adhere nicely.)

*They DO make gluten-free bread crumbs you could use to make a breaded chicken, however those contain yeast and other preservatives that I cannot have, and I LOVED the crunch these crackers provided. 

Preheat oven to 450 degrees and spray cookie sheet with cooking spray.

Place in a single layer on a greased cookie sheet (I used organic olive oil cooking spray)

Bake for 20-30 minutes until cooked through.  My crackers got a little too done at 35 minutes, so I altered the recipe to a shorter time. Make SURE your chicken is cooked all the way through. You could also alter it to a lower temp at the longer time. Each cracker/cooking spray is different for how it cooks the gluten-free cracker because they are so dry. 

Combine remaining BBQ sauce and honey to make a dipping sauce & enjoy!