CHICKEN KORMA…MAKE MINE HOME-MADE!
Chicken Korma…home-made & finger licking good!
‘The chicken korma, with a fat content of 95.4g (136% of a woman’s GDA) & a salt content of 1.1g 18.3% of GDA, made it to the list too. Others included a king prawn chowmein, a lamb curry, a medium pizza with garlic bread.’ It was heartening to read that ‘there are attempts in UK to encourage chefs to use less fat & salt.’ To quote Jen Green, a scientific consultant on the survey, ” If the chef is looking to make a curry or a stir-fry, it would be useful if they had in mind how much fat & salt they put in it. It is surprising how little you need to put flavour.” I couldn’t agree more…with health issues looming large, in an already hectic & stressed lifestyle, this is food for thought!
To convert the thought back into food, here is a flavourful, simple chicken curry for the soul & spirit!
The korma is a mild, pale, creamy, curry dish originating in India. Korma has its roots in the Mughlai cuisine of North India. It is a characteristically creamy and silky Persian-Indian dish which can be traced back to the 16th century and the Mughal incursions into the North-Western parts of India and modern day Pakistan and Bangladesh.
This recipe comes from my sis in the US, also known as our family’s ‘chicken queen’, for never failing to come up with chicken in every avatar possible, from varied cuisines. North African, Mediterranean, Mexican, Indian, Middle-Eastern…the list goes on. This particular recipe is one she put together as an ‘amalgamation’ of several versions; fits the bill for a perfect & simple korma; one that uses everyday ingredients found on an Asian spice shelf. It’s been bookmarked in my folder for eons, so has to be on its way to Ruth’s Kitchen Experiments for her Bookmarked event….
Recipe… 
Ingredients:
Chicken – 1 broiler cut into pieces, the smaller the chicken the better , about 800gms (on the bone)
Onion – 3-4 md/ 250 gms, sliced fine
Green cardamom / Choti elaichi – 8-10
Cloves – 10-12
Cinnamon – 1 inch piece
Peppercorns – 8-10 are optional
Ginger paste – 2 tbsp
Garlic paste – 2 tbsp
Coriander / Dhania pwdr – 5 tsp, sifted
Chili pwdr – 2tsp / as per taste
Paprika/Deghi mirch – 1tsp
Yogurt – 250 gms / 1 cup, whisked
Method:
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Take oil in a heavy bottom pan and fry onions till a dark golden brown. Take them out, drain on kitchen towel and grind in a coffee grinder. Should be crisp dry when cool. (I crushed them between 2 sheets of absorbent paper; that absorbed some of the oil too, overall reducing the fat content)
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In the same oil, put in cardamom, cloves,cinnamon & pepper and roast a little till the cloves swell up.
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Immediately add ginger and garlic paste followed by the chicken and roast really well till the water reduces and the chicken looks light brown on all sides.
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Cover and simmer for a few minutes on low heat.
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Add coriander pwdr, chilli pwdr and paprika and mix well..keep heat medium-low…
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Then add well beaten yogurt, a little at a time, and roast for a while till it is well incorporated and makes a thickish gravy and the oil comes to the side.
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Turn flame to simmer (very low), cover pan and cook for 10 minutes till the chicken is almost done. The chicken will cook in the water left behind by the yogurt.
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The colour of the curry, at this point, will look insipid; don’t worry. The curry will come to life with a rich colour once the onion paste is added.
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Now add the ground fried onion paste and mix well. Add some water, if required to make gravy…as much or as little as you like.
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Let it come to a boil, then cover and simmer for 5-10 minutes for a last time.
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Serve hot with naan, parathas or steamed rice.
Deeba @ PAB
About me: I am a freelance food writer, recipe developer and photographer. Food is my passion - baking, cooking, developing recipes, making recipes healthier, using fresh seasonal produce and local products, keeping a check on my carbon footprint and being a responsible foodie! I enjoy food styling, food photography, recipe development and product reviews. I express this through my food photographs which I style and the recipes I blog. My strength lies in 'Doing Food From Scratch'; it must taste as good as it looks, and be healthy too. Baking in India, often my biggest challenge is the non-availability of baking ingredients, and this has now become a platform to get creative on. I enjoy cooking immensely as well.
11 Comments
Manggy
Oh my. They couldn’t possibly mean those nutritional values for a single person? Like maybe they were counting the calories of a whole large pizza?
Passionate baker...& beyond
NO Doc…that is 1 medium helping for 1 Manggy person who loves full fat & deep fried!!My kids LOVE you…a doctor to be who advocates junk food!! Mean Mom Me who says no to fast food & deep fried ever so often!! I’m off for a week, but will try & post some luscious full fat for you soon!!
Passionate baker...& beyond
NO Doc…that is 1 medium helping for 1 Manggy person who loves full fat & deep fried!!My kids LOVE you…a doctor to be who advocates junk food!! Mean Mom Me who says no to fast food & deep fried ever so often!! I’m off for a week, but will try & post some luscious full fat for you soon!!
Mike of Mike's Table
This looks delicious and I love chicken korma!
Mallika
I couldn’t agree more! It’s been years since I touched an Indian takeaway. Chicken korma here means lumps of chicken breast in a gravy made out of cream, coconut milk and full fat yogurt… I’ll have your recipe any day!
familiabencomo
Oh this looks wonderful! I love it that your sister is the Chicken Queen – I can certainly relate. Alfredo is such a nut about fat content in food. We never eat at fast food restaurants because of it (much to my chagrin – I really enjoy french fries!).
Things are back to a normal pace now. Yay! I’m slowly catching up on my blogging friends & I wanted to drop by yours at the first chance.
Tanti baci, my friend,
Amy
Ivy
I think the more we learn about food the more conscious we are with what we eat. We have stopped eating ready made food for a long time now.
Jamie
Wow. It is 8:30 am and I am already hungry for lunch thanks to your extremely tempting Korma. It looks fantastic!
Ruth Elkin
Wow!!!! I love getting a good chicken korma from the takeaway. Mind you I always find the portion size to be huge and have to split it and have some for dinner and finish it for lunch the following day.
I’ll have to try making this myself sometime.
PS I didn’t get an email to for bookmarked recipes, did it bounce back when you sent it?
Kalai
This chicken looks so tantalizingly delicious!! Bookmarked! 🙂
The Daily Rant
WOW! This blog is BEAUTIFUL! I definitely will be coming back, collecting recipes for when I have time off the road – that’s when I cook!
This chicken dish looks amazing. It’s first on my list so far!!
Salena
The Daily Rant