Butter Chicken | Murgh Makhani

Butter Chicken or Murgh Makhani is made with the left over tandoori chicken in mild-spicy and silky tomato gravy. Because of the not-overpowering spiciness it is been loved by all, especially non-Indians. I can see lots of ready-to-serve packs of butter chicken in most of the stores here in US. They love to have the butter chicken with the plain tandoor naan which is also readily available. It can also be served with jeera rice and I served it with peas pulao.

You will be wondering, I haven’t tasted this butter chicken in any of the restaurants until I make it myself. After looking at the people here craving for butter chicken I thought of trying at home. The original recipe has cream and I replaced it with few cashew nuts which give a creamy texture to the gravy. Most of the restaurants uses tandoor chicken. Here am using the shallow frying method to cook the chicken. You can also deep fry the chicken. This is just a step to avoid the chicken oozing out excess water while cooking with the gravy.

Preparation time: 10-15 minutes

Cooking time: 20-30 minutes

Ingredients

1 cup Chicken (cubed)

1 onion

2 tomatoes

1-2 green chillies

1 tsp ginger-garlic paste

10 cashews

1 tsp cumin seeds

1tsp chilli powder (adjust to taste)

1 tsp coriander powder

½ tsp turmeric powder

Generous pinch of kasoori methi

Salt

1 tbsp Butter

Oil (for frying)

How to make it

• Wash and rinse the chicken cubes with turmeric powder. Marinate the chicken with chilli powder, coriander powder, turmeric powder, ginger-garlic paste and salt for 30 mins.
• Shallow fry the chicken cubes in hot oil. Keep aside.

• In a wide pan heat 1 tsp of oil and add cumin seeds. Once it splutters add onions, green chillies. Fry till transparent.

• Then add the tomatoes and mix well. Cook till the tomatoes turn mushy. Cool at room temp and blend into a smooth paste along with cashew nuts.

• In the same pan heat butter and add the ground paste. Add 1 cup of water to the paste and allow it to boil.

• Add the crushed kasoori methi to it and stir well.

• Once the consistency reaches add the fried chicken pieces to the boiling gravy.

• Serve hot with roti/chapathi.

Notes

1. To avoid the frying step, use the chicken tikka if u has few in hand.