Barbecue Chicken Sandwich

June. The world is in pain. The killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis on May twenty-fifth, which was the day I made ribs and sat with Calvin and set two empty places at the table, has set off something that I have been watching build my entire life—a reckoning that has come before in different forms and that is here again, in a different form, in a different century but the same country, in the same Alabama that bombed the 16th Street Baptist Church when I was a child and that is now watching its cities fill with people saying: no more. Enough. No more.

Calvin has been speaking and writing and visiting and doing what pastors do when the world is on fire: he is present, he is pastoral, he is processing his own pain while holding everyone else's, which is the oldest job description in ministry and the most quietly devastating. I make sure he eats. I bring food to his study. I make sure the food is good, not just present—real food, the kind that has intention in it, the kind that says I see you, I know you are carrying a great deal, here is something made with care and love and the full knowledge that you need nourishment to do what you are called to do. A preacher who is not fed cannot feed. That is the whole rule.

I have been thinking about Bernice and about the tradition she was part of—the tradition of Black Southern women who fed the community through everything history threw at it, who stood in the church kitchen and in the home kitchen and made food that said: you are still here, we are still here, we will keep feeding each other as long as we are standing, and when we cannot stand we will cook sitting down. I come from that tradition. I am that tradition. The tradition is mine and I carry it into June 2020 and I will carry it forward as long as I have hands.

When I brought food to Calvin’s study that week, it could not be something tentative—it had to be something with backbone, something Southern, something that Bernice herself might have wrapped in foil and carried across a church parking lot without a word of explanation because none was needed. A Barbecue Chicken Sandwich is exactly that kind of food: it is substantial and it is sweet and it is smoky and it asks nothing of the person eating it except that they sit down for a moment and let themselves be fed. That is all I wanted for him. That is all this tradition has ever asked of us—to sit down, to receive, to know that someone saw you and made something with their hands on purpose.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 45 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken thighs
1 cup barbecue sauce, plus more for serving
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 sturdy sandwich buns or brioche rolls, toasted
1 cup prepared coleslaw, for serving
Bread-and-butter pickles, for serving

Instructions

Season the chicken. Pat chicken thighs dry with paper towels. In a small bowl, combine garlic powder, onion powder, smoked paprika, salt, and pepper. Rub the spice mixture evenly over both sides of each thigh.
Sear. Heat olive oil in a large skillet or cast-iron pan over medium-high heat. Add chicken thighs and cook undisturbed for 5–6 minutes until deeply golden on the underside. Flip and cook another 4–5 minutes.
Add the sauce. Reduce heat to medium-low. Pour barbecue sauce over the chicken, turning each piece to coat. Cover and let the chicken cook in the sauce for 10–12 minutes, until cooked through and the sauce has thickened slightly around the meat.
Rest and shred or slice. Transfer chicken to a cutting board and let rest 5 minutes. Either slice thighs thick on the bias or use two forks to pull the meat into generous chunks. Return to the pan and toss to coat once more in the sauce.
Assemble. Toast buns until just golden. Pile chicken onto the bottom bun, spoon a little extra sauce over the top, add a generous scoop of coleslaw, and finish with two or three pickle slices. Set the top bun on and serve immediately, with extra napkins—this is not a tidy sandwich and it is not meant to be.

Nutrition (per serving)

Barbecue Chicken Sandwich — The Oldest Rule in Ministry Is That a Preacher Must Be Fed