Bacon Wrapped Chicken Tenders with Raspberry Chipotle Sauce

Bacon Wrapped Chicken Tenders with Raspberry Chipotle Sauce are smoky, spicy with the right amount of sweetness.  They make a great appetizer or entree.

How are you doing with your spring cleaning?  We’ve been knee-deep in major spring cleaning.  I was able to arrange my schedule to where I had five (count ’em five!) days off in a row.  In that period of time, we:

• Had the windows washed
• Had outdoor and some indoor furniture cleaned
• I cleaned and organized our attic

Please don’t hate on me for hiring someone to wash our windows.  When we bought our home 12 years ago, my stepdaughter was eager to earn extra money so we hired her to do the windows.  She finished them, came into the house and proclaimed, “I’m NEVER doing that again!”

The following year, I did it and when I was finished, I proclaimed, “I’m NEVER doing that again!”  My husband was traveling a lot for his job at the time so he didn’t have time to do it.  I’m sure he also would have proclaimed, “I’m NEVER doing that again!”

Yes, we kinda live in a glass house.  The back of our home is almost all windows and we are on a wooded lot which means lots of creepy crawlies, bird gunk, pollen and overall garden-variety dirt.  Falling off a ladder is never a good thing either so you just have to know when to turn it over to the pros!

The attic is a whole ‘nother story for another day!  Buying all that crap seemed like such a good idea at the time!  It all got used for a while but in the end wasn’t anything truly important, life-changing or sentimental.  The “stuff” is all going to local charitable and religious organizations so my guilt is mildly reduced and it will now help people in need.

However, here’s a recipe you’re going to want to keep around!

Everything is better with bacon and chicken tenders are just screaming to be wrapped in a slice of smoky, delicious bacon!

You could do two slices around the tender, but I think the bacon would then be overwhelming.  Chicken tenders are just the right size with one strip wrapped around to cook through in a non-stick skillet in about 10 minutes.  (I love Calphalon non-stick!)

My amazing 89-year-old father grows some of the most beautiful raspberry bushes on the planet and we are the happy recipients of the abundance each year.  We still had some in the freezer from last year which is what I used.  Use frozen raspberries from your local grocery store or even raspberry preserves to make this sauce.  (Raspberry preserves can be on the sweet side, so sure to adjust the sweetness to your taste.)  This dish can be adapted easily to the Paleo diet by using honey instead of the sugar.

Now let’s eat!

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Bacon Wrapped Chicken Tenders with Raspberry Chipotle Sauce

Print shopping list

Prep Time 10 min

Cook Time 30 min

Total Time 40 mins

Ingredients

• SAUCE
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 small red onion, finely chopped (approximately 1/2 cup)
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• 1 (12-ounce) bag frozen raspberries
• 2 chipotle chiles in adobo sauce
• 2 tablespoons adobo sauce
• 2 tablespoons balsamic or raspberry vinegar
• 1/4 cup sugar (or as needed)
• salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• TENDERS
• 1 (8-ounce) package chicken tenders (tenderloin)
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 8 slices bacon (or 1 per tender)

Directions

1. SAUCE
2. Heat olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the onion, reduce heat to medium and cook, stirring often until soft, approximately 10 minutes. Add the garlic and cook 30 seconds. Add the remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer 8-10 minutes or until thickened and reduced by 1/3. Remove from the heat and cool.
3. Puree in a food processor or blender, then strain through a sieve, pressing on solids to extract as much sauce as possible. Serve sauce with chicken tenders.
4. TENDERS
5. Season chicken tenders with salt and black pepper. (You may wish to lighten up on the salt as the bacon is salty.) Wrap a bacon slice around each chicken tender.
6. Preheat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Place the chicken tenders in the pan with the end of the bacon strip down. (This will help "seal" the bacon onto the chicken.)
7. Brown the chicken well on all sides until bacon and chicken are cooked through to 165 degrees.

by Carol | From A Chef's Kitchen

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