Chicken Tikka Masala

Week 2 of the Cookbook Challenge – the theme this week is Indian. I went with a very unimaginative recipe – a curry – but it was still a challenge for me though as I rarely cook curry. I consulted the always reliable Jamie Oliver’s Ministry of Food

The recipe is really simple and it turned out well

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

4 chicken breasts

2 medium onions

1 fresh red chilli

a thumb sized piece of fresh ginger

small bunch of fresh coriander

vegetable oil

knob of butter

tikka masala paste (see further down for details)

sea salt

black pepper (ground)

1 x 400g tin of chopped tomatoes

1 x 400ml tin coconut milk

200g natural yoghurt

small handful of flaked almonds

1 lemon

Tikka Masala Paste

2 cloves garlic

thumb sized piece fresh ginger

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 tablespoon paprika

2 teaspoons garam masala

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

2 tablespoons groundnut oil (I just used vegetable oil)

2 tablespoons tomato paste

2 fresh red chillies

small bunch fresh coriander

1 tablespoon desiccated coconut

2 tablespoons ground almonds / almond meal

1 teaspoon cumin seeds (for toasting)

1 teaspoon coriander seeds (for toasting)

To make the paste

Peel the garlic and ginger. Put a frying pan on medium – high heat and add the spices for toasting to the dry pan. Lightly toast them for a few minutes until golden brown and smelling delicious, then remove from the pan from the heat. Add the toasted spices to a pestle and mortar and grind until fine or put into a food processor and wizz to a power (I cheated a bit here – I couldn’t find corriander and cumin seeds so I just added powder straight away).

Add this and the other ingredients into a food processor and wizz until you have a smooth paste.

To make the curry

Slice the chicken into thin strips. Peel, halve and finely slice the onions. Finely slice the chilli. Peel and finely slice the ginger. Pick the coriander leaves and put to one side, then finely chop the stalks.

Put a large casserole type pan on medium – high heat and add a couple of lugs of oil and the butter. Add the onions, chilli, ginger and coriander stalks and cook for 10 minutes, until softened and golden. Add the curry paste and the strips of chicken. Stir well to coat everything with the paste and season with salt and pepper. Add the tomatoes and coconut milk. Fill one of the empty tins with water, pour into the pan and stir again. Bring to the boil, then turn the heat down and simmer for 20 minutes with the lid on. Check regularly to make sure it’s not drying out and add extra water if necessary. When the meat is tender and cooked, taste and add a bit more salt and pepper if you need to.

Serve with rice with a few spoonfuls of yoghurt on top. Sprinkle the almonds and coriander leaves and serve with some lemon wedges for squeezing over.