Finally I have started cooking with bone-in chicken. I am yet to find already cut bone-in Organic chicken here in grocery stores. So I always cooked with boneless chicken. I know it is very easy to cut a whole chicken, I have seen so many videos, but I still cannot get myself to do it. Few months back, one of my friends sent me a chicken curry with bone-in chicken. I don’t know if it was the pregnancy or if it was really that good, I started craving for bone-in chicken. So now V buys whole chicken from Whole Foods Market and gets it cut every time. Since I am trying to include more chicken in our diet, you will see more chicken recipes here in coming days.
These days I try to make something very simple and hearty for lunch and dinner. I made up this recipe last time and it came out so well. We have really started to like curry leaves and chicken combination – which we were not very used to before.
Ingredients: 1 lb (approx 1/2 kg) chicken 1 tea spn garam masala 1 tea spn ginger-garlic paste 1 tea spn chopped ginger 1 tea spn chopped garlic 5-6 strands coriander leaves 10-12 curry leaves 1 tbl spn yogurt 3/4 cup onion 1 tbl spn fresh/frozen coconut 1 tea spn chilli powder 1/2 cup tomato A pinch turmeric Oil Salt
Method:
Apply ginger-garlic paste, yogurt, a little salt, turmeric to chicken and keep aside for atleast 30mins. Heat oil and fry 1/2 cup onion, 1/4 cup tomato, ginger and garlic. When they are translucent add chilli powder, turmeric, 1/2 tea spn garam masala, coconut. Fry for few minutes. Grind with coriander leaves. Heat a little oil in same pan, add remaining onions and 5-6 curry leaves. When the onions turn translucent, add marinated chicken. Fry for few minutes. Add remaining tomato, ground paste, salt. Cook till the chicken is completely cooked. Now sprinkle remaining garam masala and remaining curry leaves. Cook for 1-2mins. Serve hot with chapatis.
Serves : 3-4 Preparation time : 25mins
Zunka is a popular Maharashtrian dish and it is also very popular in Karnataka-Maharashtra border area. Though I got exposed to several dishes when I was studying at Belgaum, this Zunka is something I could never appreciate till I got married !! The dryer version of Zunka has a texture and husky smell of Chickpeas flour(Besan) which kept me away from this. The credit of making me like this dish goes to Rashmi, my wife. When she decided to prepare this for first time, I remember telling her, there are very few dishes on earth that I don’t like and Zunka is definitely one of them. However my opinion got changed when I tried this ‘watery version’ of Zunka. The texture and taste of this is quite different from traditional thick one and perhaps that results in a different appeal. But please note that thicker version is more popular and if you visit restaurant and order for this, you are most likely to get the traditional one(and this is not that version).
Ingredients: 4 tbl spns besan (bengal gram flour) 1 cup chopped onions ½ cup grated coconut 1 tea spn mustard seeds (rai/sarson) 1 tea spn cumin seeds (jeera) A pinch of asafoetida (hing) 5 slit green chillies 1/2 tea spn turmeric powder (haldi) 2 tbl spn coconut oil(or olive oil or any other oil) Few curry leaves Salt and water to taste
Method: Mix besan in half cup of water and stir to ensure no lumps are formed and keep it aside(Most important step to get consistency and uniform taste). Heat oil in a thick bottomed vessel, add mustard seeds. When they start spluttering, add asafoetida, curry leaves, pinch of turmeric powder and green chillies. You may add 1 tsp of crushed ginger(not added in pictures) and jeera and fry for a minute. Add onion and fry till it becomes translucent stirring occasionally. Mix earlier dissolved Besan to this. While stirring, add a cup of more water. This is desired to get right texture and especially if you don’t like smell of Besan flour. Add salt as desired. Add grated coconut. Bring it to boil and keep stirring till gravy thickens. Do not attempt to dry out additional water. The real skill and perfection of this dish lies here. Serve hot with rice or jawaar or baajra rotis. Pictures shown here are with rice rotis. This dish has to be spicy and milder version may not go well with rotis .
PS: There are various other versions of this in terms of ingredients and texture. You may use red chilli powder instead of green chillies or along with them. You may add crushed garlic. Instead of opting for semi-gravy texture, you may go for thick paste.
Serves : 2-3 Preparation time : 20mins
