I made up some
Tandoori masala (spice mix) to get some different flavourings into our dinners. The kids have been complaining about us always having the same old thing
. It's because there are only a few dishes all 5 of us enjoy and/or can actually eat so, short of making more than one meal at a time to satisfy everybody at once, my range has been a bit limited.
Tandoori masala is an ingredient used in butter chicken which all of us enjoy so that's what I made for dinner tonight. Everybody claimed to like it I'm happy to say
.
Here's the recipe:
Chicken:
Mix about 1/2 cup tandoori masala with 1/3 cup yogurt and 2 Tbsp lime or lemon juice, marinate chicken for at least 8 hours, over night if possible. I used 2 med breasts and a couple of thighs.
Heat the oven to 375 and cook chicken chunks in a single layer on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper or in a shallow glass dish for about 10 minutes, until nearly cooked through but not quite. Set aside
**You do not need tandoori masala or tandoori paste to make butter chicken so if you'd rather a simpler version you can skip that part and add the raw chicken chunks right to the sauce, simmer until they are cooked through, not too long or they can become tough.
Sauce:
Melt about 2 Tbsp of butter in a heavy bottomed sauce pan and slowly sauté 1 large thinly sliced onion over med heat to caramelize it. If it's getting browned at all turn the heat down, this is best done low and slow.
Add 2 cloves of minced or crushed garlic and saute until fragrant, about a minute or so.
Add 2 more Tbsp of butter, melt and stir in
1 Tbsp garam masala
2 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp cumin
Stir about until fragrant, a minute or so (I put it all in at once because I cheat, ha ha).
Add one can of tomato sauce or diced tomatoes, bring to a simmer and cook 5 minutes. Diced tomato yeilds more of a rose sauce flavour, sauce will amalgamate with the other flavours more. Both are nice, whichever you prefer is fine.
Slowly pour in heavy cream, the amount can be from 1-3 cups depending on your tastes. I recommend you eyeball the amount of sauce that will go best with the amount of chicken you prepared. Use a stick blender to puree it all, not completely smooth but no large chunks remaining. Here is where you exercise a little kitchen finesse and don't make the immersion blender spray creamy tomato sauce all over the counter, your clothes, the cell phone, etc. Sigh.
Taste and salt as needed.
Bring back to a simmer and once bubbling add the chicken. Simmer just until the meat is cooked through, too much may toughen it up.
Remove from heat, stir in 2 more Tbsp of butter and serve immediately over rice or with fresh, hot naan bread. Garnish with fresh cilantro leaves and a wedge of lime.
Please let me know if anything is not clear enough in my instructions
.
