Party time or weeknight bite
With the holidays winding down and the new year quickly approaching we’ve all got healthy eating on the brain. We’ve also got party appetizers on the brain too, what with New Years Eve party invites starting to roll in. So what’s a healthy eater to do? Do you delay your resolve to get back to regular, nourishing meals so you can enjoy the party food? Do you pack a Tupperware with carrot sticks or other bird food to hopefully keep your mind off the munchies being served? Heck no! You do neither. [adthrive-in-post-video-player video-id=”lePArT5L” upload-date=”2018-12-27T03:40:38.000Z” name=”BBQ Turkey Sloppy Joes WS” description=”These Whole30-friendly BBQ Turkey Sloppy Joes are the perfect hearty, healthy party appetizer or easy weeknight meal. Allergy friendly: Gluten-free, Dairy-free, Paleo, Egg-free, Nut-free.”] In fact, we believe that you should never have to compromise taste for health which is why we’ve got yet another healthy comfort food recipe for you today – so you can have your BBQ Turkey Sloppy Joes and enjoy the heck out of them too. Even if you’re on a Whole30, avoiding gluten/dairy/eggs/nuts, etc. So without further ado, let’s see just how simple these are to pull together with less than 10 ingredients. You can serve them as a hearty party appetizer or enjoy them for an easy weeknight meal (or even prep them ahead during your next weekly meal prep session).
Better buns
Who doesn’t want better buns? Be it in your favorite workout tights or on your plate, swapping out a refined carb bun for crispy-on-the-outside-tender-on-the-inside slices of potato means you get more nutrition bang for your buck. Often vilified, the humble potato isn’t just a starchy carb. According to Potatoes USA, potatoes are:
A good source of vitamins C and B6, potassium, magnesium, fiber, resistant starch, and antioxidants. Free of sodium, fat, and cholesterol Incredibly versatile and budget-friendly
Sure, you can use sweet potatoes for the buns (as we did for those Stovetop Sloppy Joes, these Buffalo Chicken Sliders, these Slow Cooker Chicken Sloppy Joes, or these Slow Cooker Citrus Herb Pork Sliders with Pineapple Salsa Slaw), but a good old Russet potato works beautifully too. Bottom line: Use what you’ve got on hand, what you like and/or what’s in your budget or available to you.
Lean and mean
We’ve swapped out the traditional ground beef for lean ground turkey in this recipe, but you can certainly use ground beef or ground chicken. Both will be delicious and the perfect protein-rich vehicle for the tangy, savory sauce that starts with your favorite barbecue sauce.
Gettin’ saucy
For these BBQ Turkey Sloppy Joes, we used The New Primal Classic BBQ Cooking & Dipping Sauce because it’s, well, amazing. Being that Stacie and I are both barbecue fanatics we don’t take BBQ sauce lightly. It has to be tangy, lightly sweet, slightly smoky and good on everything. This sauce fits all of those criteria and more: Whole30-approved, no refined sugars, organic, certified gluten- and dairy-free. It’s sweetened with pineapple and tamarind concentrates and has the added bonus of being made with bone broth. Oh, and it’s freaking delicious. If it wasn’t, you can be sure we wouldn’t be using it because life is too short to not eat delicious things, amirite?!
Don’t forget the slaw!
Here’s another not-so-secret fact about us – a generous dollop of cool and creamy slaw of some kind is pretty much mandatory when we’re talking about barbecue. Case in point: this Instant Pot BBQ Pulled Chicken with Simple Slaw, these Sonoran Hotdogs with Mexi Slaw, this Slow Cooker BBQ Beef with Cole Slaw, and this Slow Cooker BBQ Peach Chicken with Slaw). Clearly, it’s a killer combo so we’ve included a recipe for an ultra-simple, 4-ingredient slaw that can’t be beaten and makes everything BBQ a thousand times better.
OK, one more time. This time a little closer. Now, how can you say no to these BBQ Turkey Sloppy Joes when there’s so much flavor packed into such a cute little bite?! You can’t. So ditch the idea of skipping the appetizers on New Year’s Eve (or the Superbowl, or your next housewarming, or anytime, really) and whip up a batch of these instead.
What’s your favorite hearty appetizer? What makes it a favorite – easy to prepare, tasty, etc.? Share in the comments below!
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Photo Credit: The photos in this blog post were taken by Jess of Plays Well with Butter. This post was made possible by our friends at The New Primal. Although we received compensation for this post, the opinions expressed here are – as always – 100% our own. Thank you for supporting the great companies we work with thereby allowing us to continue creating great recipes and content for you. This post may contain affiliate links which won’t change your price but will share some commission.
