Indian butter chicken - murgh makhani

Indian food is easier to cook than you first might think.

This is my second Indian dish ever I have made in my life. The first one was dahl. Indian kitchen is so much full of flavors and it is actually easier to cook the food than you would think. This butter chicken is only one version that exists in the world so there is no one right recipe for this one.

Marinate for chicken:

600 g chicken fillets
3 dl buttermilk

Marinate at least 8 hours in buttermilk. Also youghurt
works very well.

Slice or dice the chicken. Marinate the chicken in buttermilk for at least 8 hours. After this add the spices listed below:

2-3 minced garlic cloves (or 2 tsp garlic paste)
2 tsp ginger paste
1 dried red thai chili in flakes
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp garam masala
1 tbsp lemon juice

Continue marinating for couple of more hours. Did you know that calsium makes the meat tender and prevents it drying when cooking?

Grill the chicken pieces until they are
cooked.

After the chicken pieces are marinated grill them for 10-15 minutes or until they are thoroughly cooked.

Sauce:

1 clove of minced garlic
2 tsp of ginger paste
2 cardermom pods
3 coriander seeds
1 bay leave
2 cloves
3 tsp garam masala
2 tsp turmeric
1-2 dried red thai chili in flakes
1 dl tomato puré
2 tomatoes
juice from half a lemon
100 g butter
3 dl cream
1,5 tbsp sugar

Ingredients for the sauce.

Cook the minced garlic and ginger paste for couple of minutes in small amount of butter (1 tbsp) on medium fire. Break roughly the cardermom pods and coriander seeds. Add the cardermom pods, coriander seeds, bay leave, cloves, garam masala, turmeric and chili flakes on the pan. Mix well.
Add the tomato puré, diced tomatoes and lemon juice. Cook on medium fire for couple minutes. Add 100 g of butter piece by piece. Add the cream. Mix well and pour the sauce to another pan through a sieve. You can use a spoon to get all the sauce through the sieve so that only the spices and tomato skins are left on the sieve.

Add the butter in pieces.

Sieve the sauce to another pan so that
you will get a smooth sauce.

Now let this sieved sauce to cook on low fire for 5 minutes and then season with salt and sugar. Add the chicken and cook for another 10 minutes on low fire.

Finally add the chicken and let the sauce to simmer for
another 10 minutes on low fire.

Serve with rice that is cooked with one cinnamon stick, 2 cardermom pods, couple of cloves and fennel seeds.

Cook the rice with cinnamon, cardermom pods,
cloves and fennel seeds.

Serve the butter chicken with naan bread,
mango chutney, raita and jasmin rice.