Big Boy’s Brunch

As Kevin will tell you, most of us folks from the East End of London are partial to the odd curry. Having started out on my Dad’s homemade curries based on meals he’d eaten while in India with the army, I have enjoyed many curries over the years. From beer-chasing curries in student discount curry houses to the home cooked dishes of Indian friends, I have come to appreciate the almost infinite variety of foods from the Indian subcontinent.

Although I enjoy cooking, there are days when I wish that I could walk through the door after a long day and find a meal has magically cooked itself. Though that day may be a long way off, we recently picked up a family sized crockpot (slow cooker) that gets us a little closer. Given that rich, sauce based curries lend themselves to slow cooking, it seemed only fitting that the first meal cooked in our new purchase was just such a dish.

As the tolerance of chili and spices varies in the family, I decided on a curry house style butter chicken dish. Much like the British obsession with chicken tikka masala, butter chicken is very popular with Kiwis and is readily accepted as an authentic Indian dish, despite a somewhat doubtful and hazy provenance.

Regardless of authenticity, the only real test is taste and flavour and this slow cooked curry proved to be very popular with four out of the five present and declared one of the best curries ever made in our house. In fact, we polished the whole thing off inside 15 minutes despite having said we’d save a portion for the absent curry-loving daughter. All of which means I’ll be making it again soon and, having written about it here, I’d better invite Kevin and Tanya too!

Makhni Chicken

This recipe was adapted from one I found on Yogi Gupta’s web site Indiacurry.com. I substituted extra yoghurt for a reduced amount of cream and added a little hot curry paste which gave a little more depth to the flavour without adding any more heat.

3 tablespoons cooking oil
3 or 4 large skinless chicken breasts cut into bite size pieces.
1 finely chopped onion
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 tablespoon minced garlic
½ tablespoon minced ginger
2 teaspoons curry powder
1 tablespoon hot curry paste
3 tablespoons yoghurt
1 cup chopped tomatoes
2 tablespoons butter
¼ cup water
1 teaspoon garam masala
½ teaspoon paprika
½ cup cream

Heat the oil in a heavy bottom pan and fry chicken pieces till white/light brown. Remove with slotted spoon and put in the crock pot. Add onions, salt and cayenne to hot oil in the pan. Sauté until the onions are translucent and the edges start to turn brown. Add the garlic and ginger, sauté for another 2 minutes. Add the curry powder and paste and sauté for a minute before adding yoghurt and reducing for 2-3 minutes. Add the tomatoes and butter and heat until the mixture starts to bubble before transfering to your crock pot. Use the ¼ cup water to deglaze the pan and add water to the crock pot. Add remaining ingredients, except for the garam masala and cream, stir and cover the crock pot. Set the crockpot to high, After the first 40 minutes, turn down cooker to low and leave to cook for 5 hours, stirring in the cream and garam masala 10 minutes before the end. Alternatively, if you want a quicker result, cook at high for 4 hours. Serve with basmati rice and roti