North Indian made easy 5: chicken

“I’ve collected more than thirty home-style recipes, and I’ve been returning the generosity by cooking ‘exotic’ dinners for my new friends (most foreign dishes in restaurants here are given a Japanese twist, taking away from their ethnic flare). In Kyoto it was French food, the fond sauce transported from Nara (combined with sake, mirin and herbs) drizzled over plump pork medallions. We had a Mexican fiesta with Risa’s amigas, followed by a Greek night with souvlaki and homemade cheese (I have a Middle Eastern recipe for making salty cheese out of yogurt, a desperate man’s replacement for feta). And Kyle and company were treated to a huge North Indian feast including tandoori chicken (made in the tiny grill/oven that’s part of the kitchen sets here, usually used for grilling fish). It didn’t have the burning bite that you get from the tandoor (and from more chili powder, which I knew they wouldn’t be able to handle), but it turned out really well!” (p.20)

It wouldn’t be fair to share a series of North Indian recipes, without mention of its famous tandoori and butter chicken. For many who have only eaten Indian food in Western restaurants, these are some of the signature dishes that you would crave. I couldn’t find any historical information to support my observation, but it seems that similar to China, where there is a wealth of diverse cuisines in the country, but Cantonese/Hong Kong food is the best known to the rest of the world thanks to the majority of emigrants leaving from the Hong Kong area (historically speaking; this is changing today), it is citizens of Punjab who seem to be the biggest group of Indians who have emigrated to the ‘developed’ world, making their food the most famous internationally along the way.

Tandoori marinade has a number of ingredients in it that may not be readily available to everyone, so here is the simplified version I prepared for friends in Japan (click here for my second, more complete recipe and explanation of ingredients):

Tandoori marinade

plain thick unsweetened yogurt, fresh lime juice, a touch of mustard, coriander powder, cumin powder, red chili powder, a small amount of hydrated chickpeas (there would usually be chickpea (gram) flour paste used in their place; if you don’t have either, you can live without them), garam masala spice mix (if you have it)

- first hang the yogurt on a sieve or in a cloth for about thirty minutes, to drain some of the liquid out of it (I usually wrap it in a cloth and tie it to the sink faucet to drip)
- if using hydrated chickpeas, mash them into a fine paste
- mix curd with lime, paste, mustard until smooth and uniform, then mix in spices  until uniform again

Tandoori style chicken

chicken cut into quarters, ginger and garlic crushed into a paste, salt, red chili powder, white vinegar, a touch of mustard, tandoori marinade

- preheat oven or barbecue
- leaving tandoori marinade aside, mix all other ingredients together, coating chicken
- let it sit for an hour or so, then strain moisture from chicken by squeezing it with your hands
- coat chicken with tandoori marinade, cook until tender

The dish may not look like tandoori chicken hanging on an iron spit, but it will taste pretty damn good.

If you’ve already gone through the pain of creating your own tandoori marinade from scratch (you can also buy it in boxes), butter chicken is actually tandoori chicken taken out of the oven early, and allowed  to finish cooking in sauce.

Butter chicken

tandoori chicken, onion tomato gravy, water, salt, cumin powder, coriander powder, butter, cream

- cook chicken about 80% complete uncovered in oven or on barbecue
- heat tomato gravy with a bit of water, spices, and the chicken, until sizzling
- add butter, cream, let thicken, and serve hot!

For another meat dish using the onion tomato gravy, you can create kadhai chicken, by simply replacing the paneer in the kadhai paneer recipe with tandoori chicken as well.

Enjoy!!