Category: "Garam Masala"

Butter chicken

by Don  

Source: video

Ingredients for the chicken

  • 300 gms chicken breast boneless
  • 1 tsp ginger paste
  • 1 tsp garlic paste
  • 1 tsp Kashmiri red chilli powder
  • 1/2 tsp salt or to taste
  • Oil to pan fry

Ingredients for gravy

  • 500 gms roughly slit tomatoes
  • 100 gms roughly cut onions
  • 1 tbsp garlic paste
  • 50 gms cashew
  • 1 tsp kasoori methi
  • 1/2 tsp garam masala
  • 4 tbsp sugar
  • 2 tbsp kashmiri chilli powder
  • 5 tbsp butter
  • 3 tbsp cream
  • 2 tbsp malt vinegar / 1.5 tbsp White Vinegar
  • Salt to taste

Method

  • Marinate the chicken with ginger paste, garlic paste, red chilli powder. Salt and keep it aside for 15 to 20 minutes.
  • In a pan heat some oil, then fry the marinated chicken pieces in it. Once done place it into a bowl.
  • In the same pan add onion, oil, a spoonful of butter. Once the onions are cooked, add tomatoes and cashews.
  • Add some water and garlic paste, salt, malt vinegar, sugar, garam masala, and chilli powder. Evenly mix it and let it simmer for 15-20 minutes
  • Churn the mixture into fine puree with a hand blender.
  • Strain it back into the same pan. Make sure there is minimal wastage.
  • Add butter, cream, chicken and kasoori meethi. Let it simmer for 5-7 minutes.
  • Garnish it with cream and kasoori meethi.

2019-01-18: I tried the recipe for the first time, but didn't have all the ingredients. Here are my comments.

  • I substitute Szeged paprika instead of Kashmiri chili.
  • I used rice wine vinegar instead of malt vinegar.
  • I didn't have garlic/ginger paste, so I substituted chopped garlic from a jar and ginger paste from a plastic container.
  • I used curry powder instead of garam masala.
  • Make sure to cut the chicken into thin chunks.

I like the result. It was rather more savory than the butter chicken I had the other day at Curry Corner.

Garam masala, 1a

by Don  

I came across a recipe for slow-cooker chicken tikka, which includes a reference to garam masala. But there are so many types of garam masala that the reference is almost useless. Fortunately, the recipe linked a specific garam masala (Frontier Seasoning Blends Garam Masala) that had this ingredient list:



From there I looked at my Indian cookbook (Classic 1000 Indian Recipes) and adapted its Garam Masala I recipe from p. 12. This is my take on it.

Guesstimated recipe and procedure

  • 1/4 cup of black cardamom seeds
  • 1/4 cup of cumin seeds
  • 1/4 cup of cloves
  • 1 oz of cinnamon sticks
  • 1/4 cup of black peppercorns
  • 1/4 cup of coriander seeds

Grind the ingredients together in a coffee grinder and grind to a fine powder.