Honey-baked chicken drumsticks

No beating about the bush, no bluffing. Today I made a perfect dinner. Within my abilities, of course 🙂 It was my first time making chicken drumsticks this way, while also preparing baked potatoes and beetroot. And, as happens with first times, it turned out brilliantly. But then, I am a man 😉

Basically, I made these chicken drumsticks for myself and Ninka, who is very fond of the ones from a certain three-letter fast-food chain. Unfortunately, that’s how children are. Yet even at that chain, Ninka ate her chicken without the coating. So my drumsticks had to meet at least the no-coating requirement (which is fairly normal when eating chicken drumsticks in the usual way), but they also couldn’t be at all hot, spicy or „overseasoned”.

So I decided to make them with honey. Mild, genuinely without excessive seasoning. Just don’t forget this: you need to salt them quite generously. Not too much, of course (you know the consequences ;)), but more than just a tiny bit.

And they turned out delicious. Really. I recommend them.

At a glance: 

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Marinating time: at least 1 hour

Baking time: 2 hours

Baking temperature: 180 degrees Celsius

Serves: 3 – 4 portions

How many calories: a few, unless you skip the skin 🙂

Ingredients for chicken drumsticks:

• 9 chicken drumsticks
• 2 tablespoons of linden honey
• olive oil
• ground black pepper
• salt
• sweet paprika powder

Recipe for chicken drumsticks:

The recipe for chicken drumsticks is quite simple, but they won’t turn out well unless you marinate them beforehand. Here’s how I did it:

I washed the chicken drumsticks thoroughly and removed any remaining feathers (it happens). I dried them with a paper towel. I put them in a bowl and added two tablespoons of honey, a pinch of ground pepper, quite a lot of salt and a pinch of sweet paprika. I poured olive oil over them. I mixed everything thoroughly by hand, covered it with aluminium foil and put it in the oven for several hours (5 hours, to be precise, but I think even an hour would be enough).

I preheated the oven to 180 degrees Celsius. I transferred the drumsticks to a glass baking dish (you can see it in the photos), covered it with aluminium foil and put it in the oven.

After an hour, I moved the drumsticks around and removed the foil. I baked them for 30 minutes, then moved them around and covered them with foil again (for 15 minutes).

After 15 minutes of baking under the foil again, I removed it once more and baked them for another 15 minutes. The drumsticks should be lightly browned. Quite a lot of fat should also have rendered out of them (you can see that in the photos below too). The dish is ready. Enjoy!

I served them with my baked potatoes and sweet roasted beetroot. Everything can be cooked in the oven at the same time. It tastes great. I recommend it.