BBQ Chicken Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

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Stuffed sweet potatoes are an easy, delicious and healthy lunch or dinner recipe with only a handful of ingredients.

Just bake sweet potatoes, fill them with shredded chicken mixed with BBQ sauce and top with slices of red onion and fresh cilantro for a flavorful, filling, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 recipe.

BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes are a healthy, easy, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 meal.

Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

If you’ve never stuffed sweet potatoes before, you’re in for a treat. It’s a wonderful weeknight meal that’ll keep you full. It’s also perfect for game nights.

You can stuff sweet potatoes with a variety of ingredients, but today we’re making barbecue chicken stuffed sweet potatoes and keeping the toppings simple.

I’m such a fan of stuffing vegetables and turning them into complete meals. It gives you a nutrient boost, negates the need for bread or tortillas (which you might normally use) and keeps things naturally gluten-free.

My Tuna Stuffed Avocados and Taco Stuffed Zucchini Boats are two delicious examples. Avocados, zucchini and sweet potatoes – yes, they’re all great to stuff.

BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes are a healthy, easy, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 meal.

The Best Sized Sweet Potatoes to Use

You can stuff any sized sweet potatoes, but sweet potatoes that are medium round in shape are best to slice open and stuff with ingredients.

If you’re baking several sweet potatoes at the same time it’s also best to purchase sweet potatoes about the same size. This will ensure the sweet potatoes are cooked at the same rate and prevent some from being overcooked or undercooked.

How do you Bake Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes are easy to bake in the oven – preheat your oven to 400 degrees fahrenheit, give them a wash and scrub, poke them with a fork a few times, lay them on a baking sheet and cook for approximately 60 minutes.

If you’ve never baked sweet potatoes before, I’ve written a step-by-step recipe tutorial on that – Baked Sweet Potatoes: How to Bake Sweet Potatoes Perfectly. Check out that post for more tips.

BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes are a healthy, easy, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 meal.

BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes are a healthy, easy, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 meal.

How to Make BBQ Chicken Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

While your sweet potatoes are baking in the oven you can cook your chicken on the stovetop. The chicken only takes 15 minutes to cook and 15 seconds to shred if you use my favorite kitchen hack – shredding chicken in your stand mixer. It’s ingenious and the easiest way to make shredded chicken.

In terms of the sauce, you can make BBQ sauce at home or buy it from the store. To keep this recipe no fuss and Whole30 compliant I’m using Primal Kitchen Classic BBQ Sauce. It’s tasty, made from wholesome ingredients and has no added sugar. You could also try The New Primal Classic BBQ Sauce or Tessemae’s Organic BBQ Sauce.

After your chicken is shredded, just mix it with the BBQ sauce in a bowl. You could also mix the shredded chicken with BBQ sauce in a sauté pan if you’d like to serve it up hot.

BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes are a healthy, easy, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 meal.

What Toppings to add to the BBQ Chicken

Because the barbecue chicken has so much flavor you don’t need a lot of toppings. I’m sprinkling red onion and cilantro on top, but a drizzle of my avocado dressing or savory cashew cream (a dairy-free sour cream) would also be amazing.

For More Healthy Weeknight Meals (that are Whole30)

BBQ chicken stuffed sweet potatoes are a healthy, easy, gluten-free, paleo and Whole30 meal.

BBQ Chicken Stuffed Sweet Potatoes

5 from 16 votes
Prep: 10 minutes
Cook: 1 hour
Total: 1 hour 10 minutes
Servings: 4 servings
Author: Lisa Bryan

Description

Stuffed sweet potatoes with BBQ chicken, red onion and cilantro. It's easy, no fuss, healthy and naturally gluten-free, paleo and Whole30. Watch the video above to see how quickly it comes together!

Ingredients 
 

  • 4 sweet potatoes
  • 3 medium chicken breasts
  • 2 tbsp avocado oil, or olive oil
  • 3/4 cup chicken broth
  • 8 ounces or more BBQ sauce
  • 1/2 cup sliced red onion
  • 1/3 cup chopped cilantro
  • salt and pepper, to taste

Instructions 

  • Preheat your oven to 400 degrees fahrenheit.
  • Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and wash your sweet potatoes. Poke the sweet potatoes 5-6 times with a fork or sharp knife, place them on the baking sheet and bake for 60 minutes. If you have large or small sweet potatoes you may need to adjust the bake time.
  • While the sweet potatoes are baking, drizzle the oil in a sauté pan on medium heat. Add the chicken breasts, season with salt and pepper and cook for 5 minutes. Flip the chicken over, add the chicken broth, cover the pan and cook for an additional 7-10 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through (to 165 degrees fahrenheit). Remove the chicken from pan and shred with two forks or a stand mixer (see my Shredded Chicken post for more details).
  • Add the shredded chicken to a bowl and mix with the BBQ sauce.
  • Slice each sweet potato in half, fill with BBQ chicken and top with red onion and cilantro.

Nutrition

Serving: 1stuffed sweet potato | Calories: 327.2kcal | Carbohydrates: 31.7g | Protein: 30.4g | Fat: 7.6g | Saturated Fat: 1.7g | Cholesterol: 76.5mg | Sodium: 422.8mg | Fiber: 5.1g | Sugar: 12.3g
Course: Main Course
Cuisine: American
Keyword: BBQ Stuffed Sweet Potato, Paleo Sweet Potato, Stuffed Sweet Potato, Whole30 Sweet Potato
Did you make this recipe?Mention @downshiftology or tag #downshiftology!

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About the author

Lisa Bryan

Lisa is a bestselling cookbook author, recipe developer, and YouTuber (with over 2.5 million subscribers) living in sunny Southern California. She started Downshiftology in 2014, and is passionate about making healthy food with fresh, simple and seasonal ingredients.

5 from 16 votes

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43 Comments

  1. This recipe is gold! Funny think is right after I made it the next day I seen an Instagram influencer remade this recipe too (Olivia.adriance) and knew it was from this recipe. It’s sooooo good, thank you for this easy healthy recipe. 5 stars

  2. Oh my word, what an amazing dish. Used the BBQ sauce from Lisa’s website and oh it really was the best thing to do. Really made the dish and its now one of the best dishes my family enjoyed tonight and in the future.5 stars

    1. Happy to hear you’re loving both the BBQ sauce and stuffed potatoes Bev! Thanks for leaving a review :)

    1. Yes! You can use any BBQ sauce. Heads up – I will be releasing a homemade BBQ sauce recipe later this week 😉

  3. Just made this tonight. Prepped the chicken the day before. Absolutely incredible DELICIOUS! Rather than plain red onion I used your pickled red onions. Perfectly tangy accent. Also used your suggestion of using previously cooked lentils. Could not have been better!5 stars

  4. I’ve just finished making this recipe, I absolutely loved it.
    You’re totally inspiring me to try, experiment and enjoy myself while doing this.
    Thank you Lisa.5 stars

  5. Hands Down one of our Favorite #downshiftology recipes! So simple to make, super delicious, its a must try!5 stars

  6. This is another family favorite. I had made a whole chicken and used half of it for another recipe. This was a great way to use the leftover chicken. Delicious and filling.5 stars

  7. I have looked at this page several times, backed out, then reloaded it, in case I did something to prevent the video from loading. Unfortunately, on the page I’m viewing, there is no video for the BBQ Chicken Stuffed Sweet Potatoes. Did I miss it somewhere?!

  8. So, we sort of made this recipe. :) We had leftover crispy chicken thighs (which my 12-year son made) to use in the recipe. And instead of baking the sweet potato, we used the roasted sweet potato with cut veggies and hummus. But it was delicious and easy to put together for a healthy dinner. So nice to get the children more involved in cooking.5 stars

    1. Hi Sandra – The combination of the crispy chicken and roasted sweet potatoes sounds amazing! Glad you and your family enjoyed those recipes.

    1. Hi Ashley – Isn’t it so much easier to shred in the mixer? Now you can use your shredded chicken for tons more recipes as well :)

  9. Delicious quick weeknight meal!  I used leftover shredded chicken, I didn’t have any cilantro on hand but the flavor combination was still wonderful!5 stars

  10. This is on a regular rotation at my house.  I normally have all the ingredients on hand, so if I haven’t meal prepped or am just too tired to make what is on my meal calendar, this is my go to. So simple and great tasting!5 stars

  11. Made this for dinner tonight using a smoked maple BBQ sauce. I was surprised how much the onion and cilantro added. It was so full of flavor!5 stars

    1. Hi Julie – Yum! I’m so glad you enjoyed this recipe. The onion and cilantro is definitely a must for garnishing! Those two ingredients always add a delicious punch of flavor :)

  12. This has become a family favorite! So easy, especially with the shredded chicken hack. It has turned those of us who aren’t sweet potato people into believers!5 stars

    1. Hi Katelyn – I’m so happy you and your family love the BBQ Chicken Sweet Potatoes! Thank you so much for the kind comment! :)

  13. Just made this today.  Super simple and super delicious.  Will be having it again on Saturday.  If we had 10 thumbs that is what I would give this.  Love it!5 stars

  14. Dear Lisa
    As promised I made this recipe (albeit with quorn rather than chicken) but because I am a cheeky monkey I modified the recipe a bit in as much as I mixed the sauce with soya joghurt and I mixed in one finely shopped stalk of celery and 3 finely shredded leaves of little gem lettuce. It tasted absolutely superb. And because the sweet potato was very hot temperature wise and the sauce was somewhat hot spice wise the addition of the cool joghurt and greens didn’t make the dish any less warm on a cool winter’s day (although so far we have been fortunate so far only to have had a bit of sleet). But the sweet potato tastes so much sweeter made like a baked potato than when made into fries (which we have done in the past, made in our Actifry) and perfect for someone with a sweet tooth like me.

    My weekly meal schedule is full of ideas from your YouTube videos, so I am looking forward to trying the recipes!

    How I will get on with trying to cut out sweeteners from my drinks is another matter but I managed to stop drinking Pepsi Max, so I guess nothing is impossible.5 stars

    1. I love all those changes Ursula – it’s all about being creative and making the recipe work for you! I’m happy you’ve gotten lots of ideas from my meal prep videos as well. And kudos to you for stopping the Pepsi. That’s a giant step and you’ll definitely reap the wellness rewards over the long term. :) x