Wednesday, March 10, 2010

Tasty Kitchen: Butter Chicken

 

Judging by the name of this dish, you'd assume it would be migh-tee tasty.  And you'd be right.  Slap the word 'butter' in front of pretty much anything and you've got yourself a recipe for success.  "Butter Chicken" is a fairly generic recipe name, and you wouldn't know until you looked at the ingredients list that this recipe has origins in Indian cuisine.  (Edited to add:  I just found out this dish is also known as Murg Makhani--thanks, Faith!)  This dish is one of my favorites to order at our local Indian restaurant, but at $16 a plate I thought I'd give a homemade version a shot.  It's quick and simple to make, but be sure to plan ahead as the chicken will need an overnight soak in the marinade.   

And the verdict?  Yum.  Double yum.  I'd make this again, for sure--but not without a few changes.  As written, the recipe is a wonderful intro for someone unfamiliar with Indian cuisine and its range of spices.  Butter chicken is flavorful yet mild...and obscenely decadent.  When I make this again, I plan on increasing the amount of spices (probably by at least 50%) and reducing the amount of cream.  Against my better judgment I added the entire amount, when half would probably have sufficed.  (I like to make new recipes as written the first time so I can offer valid opinions.)

The recipe comes to us from Lillieknits, a member of Pioneer Woman's Tasty Kitchen recipe sharing community.  Click HERE to view the recipe and a gorgeously photographed step-by-step tutorial by PW herself. 

8 comments:

  1. That does look mighty delicious. :) I guess I didn't even think of it as Indian food...

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  2. Oh that looks amazing!!! I love butter chicken!

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  3. Yours looks gorgeous. I can certainly see adding more spices, definitely more cayenne. I bet you could cut the cream in half and it would still be amazing. Did you end up with a bunch of extra sauce? I did. I ended up putting it over angel hair pasta.

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  4. Mmmmmm this looks great! Faith posted a butter chicken recipe on her blog once before too. I really need to give this a try...it looks so good!

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  5. Kim - I didn't end up with "extra" sauce...because I ATE IT. That sauce will be on my hips for months to come, even though I used regular instead of heavy cream :) I also cubed up the chicken and got about 6 servings out of it, so that helped spread the sauce out a bit.

    Nutmeg Nanny - I just checked Faith's blog, and her recipe looks more like what I was hoping for! It has more spices for a bolder flavor. Thanks for pointing me in that direction!

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  6. This is one of my very most favorite dishes ever! Thanks for sharing the link!

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  7. You're right, obscenely decadent is the perfect description for this. Indian Butter Chicken is my #1 favorite meal. It's taken me years (literally), but I've finally come up with a masterpiece of a recipe. This version looks incredible too!

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  8. Those sound like the type of changes I would make. I don't eat chicken, but this looks fabulous, so maybe I could try it with paneer or fish.

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