SHAHI CHICKEN KORMA

02.07.2020:  I had chicken lying in the freezer and was dreaming of butter chicken and paranthas for dinner. I opened the fridge in the evening to pick juicy, red tomatoes only to realise there were none. Who runs out of tomatoes!!! While I stood staring at the fridge, unblinking, wondering if I could make butter chicken without tomatoes, I remembered a recipe I had come across on the ‘Your Food Lab’ channel that had an onion-cashew based gravy with no tomatoes. I had saved that recipe to cook on a day when I might run out of tomatoes and have chicken in my freezer and crave for butter chicken and paranthas.

I’m a huge fan of Sanjyot Keer’s recipes, especially his gravy-based dishes. They are always thick and creamy and even if you leave out a few spices from his list, they taste great. In this recipe, he makes his own garam masala, I’ve just substituted it with store bought. I’ve also skipped mace and nutmeg. These are ingredients I never have at home.

If you love thick, creamy, rich (butter chicken kinda) gravies, you MUST try this recipe. The onions are fried till they completely brown (like the crispy fried onions used in Biryanis) and they are then ground with cashews. This flavourful sauce gives the restaurant kind taste to the gravy.

Music: In my room
Musician: LoveFine

Skip’s preference in non-vegetarian food keeps changing. He’s currently eating only Crab (to be more specific, crab claws). I tried to get Skip to eat a small chunk of the chicken, he ate a spoonful of the gravy, contorted his face, held back a gag and refused to eat more. When asked why, he said “the gravy tastes of chicken”.

Sigh.

Do not wait to run out of tomatoes to cook this dish.

SHAHI CHICKEN KORMA (serves 4)

Ingredients:

For the marinade:

Chicken – 500 gms

Ginger garlic paste – 1 tbsp

Red chilli powder – 1 tbsp

Turmeric – 1 tsp

Salt- to taste

For the onion-cashew paste:

Ghee/Oil – 4 tbsp

Onions (medium sized) – 4

Powdered cashews – 10

For the gravy:

Bay leaf- 1

Green cardamom – 2

Cloves – 2

Black peppercorn – 1 tsp

Cinnamon stick – 1 inch

Curd – 1 cup

Red chilli powder – 2 tbsp

Coriander powder- 2 tbsp

Ginger(sliced) – 1 tsp

Salt- to taste

Garam masala powder- 2 tsp

Method:

1.  To the cleaned chicken, add ginger garlic paste, red chilli powder, turmeric and salt. Mix well and marinate for about 15-20 minutes. Set aside.

2.  Heat ghee/oil in a pan. Add sliced onions to it. Cook on medium heat until the onions are nicely browned and crisp. Remove from pan and set aside on a thick paper towel.

3.     Once the fried onions have cooled, grind them with the powdered cashews into a thick, creamy paste.

4.  Into the same pan, add bay leaf, green cardamom, cloves, black peppercorn, cinnamon and add the marinated chicken to it. Fry the chicken on high flame until its partially cooked. Reduce flame.

5.  To a cup of curd, add chilli and coriander powder and whisk well. Pour the curd mixture to the fried chicken and stir continuously as you are adding it. Bring it to a boil.

6.    Add sliced ginger and salt.

7.  Cover and cook the chicken on medium flame for about 20 minutes. Stir at regular intervals.

8.   Add the onion-cashew paste. Stir well and cook for further 5 minutes. 

9.   Add garam masala powder and cook chicken until done.

10. Done.

Recipe Notes:

•       Do not place your fried onions on a paper napkin, they’ll stick to it. We may have eaten bits of paper with our korma.
•       I’ve used chicken with bones.