North Indian · Dinner
Delhi-style home butter chicken
- Total time4 hr 45 minstart to table
- Hands on40 minactual work
- EffortModerate
- Serves4as written
- Per serving~578 kcalapprox.
A home-kitchen murgh makhani: yogurt-marinated chicken is browned separately, then finished in a smooth, gently spiced tomato-cashew gravy with butter, kasuri methi and a restrained splash of cream. It is tangy and savoury rather than sugary, with the charred-chicken character kept distinct from the sauce.
Method
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Pat 700 g boneless skinless chicken thighs dry and cut it into even 3 cm pieces. Keep the raw-chicken board and knife away from ready-to-eat food.
Done when: Chicken is cut into even 3 cm pieces and raw-chicken tools remain segregated.
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In a non-reactive bowl, mix 120 g plain full-fat curd, 30 g ginger garlic paste, 2 tsp Kashmiri chilli powder, 1 tsp garam masala, 1 tbsp lemon juice and 1 1/2 tsp fine salt. Coat the chicken, cover, and refrigerate for at least 4 hours; do not marinate on the counter.
Done when: Every chicken piece is coated, the bowl is covered, and the full four-hour marination occurs under refrigeration.
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Heat 1 tbsp neutral cooking oil in the wide pan over medium-high heat. Lift chicken from the marinade, let excess drip off, and brown it in two uncrowded batches for about 4 minutes per batch. Transfer to the raw-chicken receiving plate; treat that plate and its juices as raw-contact until every piece and all juices return to the sauce.
Done when: Chicken has browned patches but is not assumed cooked through.
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Lower to medium. Add 40 g butter, then 500 g tomato puree, 30 g raw cashews and 200 ml water. Scrape up the browned bits, cover loosely, and simmer for 15 minutes, stirring every few minutes, until the tomato loses its raw smell and the cashews soften.
Done when: Tomato tastes rounded rather than raw and the cashews crush easily with a spoon.
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Take the pan off the heat for 5 minutes. Blend the sauce until completely smooth with an immersion blender, or use a countertop blender in small vented batches; never seal very hot liquid in the blender jar. Return the sauce to the pan.
Done when: The sauce is completely smooth with no visible cashew pieces and has been returned to the pan.
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Return the browned chicken and any plate juices to the sauce. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium-low heat, cover loosely, and cook for 12 minutes, stirring twice. Check the thickest pieces with a clean thermometer and continue cooking if they have not reached 74 C.
Done when: Chicken is opaque through the centre and still juicy.
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Crush 1 tsp kasuri methi between your palms and stir it in. Reduce the heat to low, add 80 ml fresh cream, and warm for 1 minute without a hard boil. Taste only after the chicken doneness check has been met; add no further seasoning because the complete listed salt, chilli and garam-masala amounts were spent in the marinade.
Done when: Sauce is smooth, glossy and coats the chicken without splitting.
Or have it read to you
In the app these same steps are read aloud one at a time, hands-free, with the timers running — and the cook guide speaks eleven Indian languages, so whoever is at the stove can follow along without reading English.
- English
- Hindi
- Tamil
- Telugu
- Bengali
- Marathi
- Kannada
- Malayalam
- Gujarati
- Punjabi
- Odia
Good to know
- Diet
- Non-vegetarian
- Contains
- milk, tree nuts
- Eaten at
- Dinner
- Nutrition, per serving
- ~578 kcal · 39 g protein · 14 g carbs · 40 g fat (approx.)
- Keeps
- 2 days in the fridge