In Search of Chicken Tikka & Chicken Tikka Masala

Chicken Tikka Masala on Basmati Rice

I adore Indian food, but I know almost nothing about it. When I was a teenager, I learned how to make five Indian dishes from my mom, who got the recipes from a YWCA cooking class in Kuala Lumpur. The dishes were/are: Tandoori Chicken, Vegetable Samosas, Dal, Cucumber Raita and Chipatis. I also learned to make homemade paneer (cheese) from milk and lemon juice, though for many years, my success with that simple recipe was hit-or-miss.

My favorite Indian dishes--the ones I order over and over again at Indian and Pakistani restaurants in Seattle, Cleveland and Pittsburgh, however, completely eluded me in the kitchen. (Until recently.) Though the recipes I attempted sounded yummy on the page and looked seductive in the accompanying foodporn photo shot, my own final product was never as satisfying, never a smoothly textured, never as amazing as the restaurant versions. Not even close.
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In the Interest of Knowledge

This last summer, I started watching the Cooking Channel, which has two Indian cooking shows, Spice Goddess with Bal Arneson and Indian Food Made Easy with Anjum Anand. Both shows have humbled me, showing me up for the literalist, old-school, uneducated cook that I really am.

For instance, WHY have I spent all those decades trying to use a mortar and pestle to grind up the spinach for palak paneer? It either comes out too stringy and chunky (and the sauce separates), or I succeed at getting rid of the strings, but the spinach comes out slimy, like Leiden canal sludge (and about as appetizing). It turns out that all I needed to do was wilt the spinach in some hot water, drain it, then pulse it in a food processor for a few second. Duh! (Click here to see Anjum Anand's video demonstation.)

I've also been humbled by my complete ignorance of which dishes are, in fact, Indian and which are actually inventions of the British. One of my daughter's favorite dishes, for example, is Chicken Tikka Masala, chicken in a mildly spiced tomato cream sauce. For most of the last year, I've been looking for recipes and getting more and more confused. Many of the recipes that I found seemed to be identical (or nearly identical), in terms of ingredients and method, as Tandoori Chicken. Some were basically just grilled chicken kabobs, with no sauce at all. Other recipes had a sauce, but the spices seemed all wrong. Some recipes had almonds or other nuts, some did not.

It took a summer of watching Spice Goddess and Indian Food Made Easy and researching recipes to finally put together (in bits and pieces) the information that:

1. Chicken Tikka is Tandoori Chicken, basically, but grilled in small pieces on a kabob instead of whole, on the bone;
2. "Masala" means sauce (which is why recipes for "Chicken Tikka" don't talk about sauce...duh!); and 
3. Chicken Tikka Masala is a relatively recent British invention, not an Indian comfort food, which is why my few Indian recipe books don't mention it at all.

Finally, I think I've "got" it:  Chicken Tikka Masala starts out as Chicken Tikka, which is basically Tandoori Chicken on a stick. First, you make Tandoori Chicken Chicken Tikka kabobs, then you take the meat off the sticks and put them into a spiced tomato-cream sauce masala.

Which is exactly what I did last weekend. Besides making raita out of beets, I also figured out how to make the following not-bad version of Chicken Tikka Masala. (And because it's not a traditional Indian classic, I don't have to worry about getting it wrong! It just has to taste good.)

Chicken Tikka & 
Chicken Tikka Masala

Step 1: Use the whole bird ... or not

I started with a whole chicken (from the same young farmer who raised the rabbit I used for Rabbit & Andouille Gumbo), because that's what I had on hand. If you are just now making up your shopping list, I'd recommend that you simply buy a few pounds of skinless, boneless chicken breasts, cut them into bite-sized cubes, and skip ahead to Step 2 (below).

Not having boneless chicken on hand, I cut the whole bird into parts and removed the breast meat and thigh meat from the bones. Then I cubed the breast meat and thigh meat for kabobs.

Step 2: Color the meat (or not) and make the marinade

I have this "thing" about red Tandoori Chicken. Though I know it's impossible, I sincerely believe the chicken tastes better if it's been artificially colored to a neon orange-ish red. It just does not taste the same (to me) if you skip the food dye. (But I leave it up to you.)

Add 24 drops of red and 12 drops of yellow food coloring to the raw meat. Yes, this is much more food coloring than you'll normally find listed in other Tandoori Chicken and Tikka Chicken recipes, but I don't see the point of food coloring unless you're going for that WOW! factor.

In a separate bowl, assemble the marinade:

• 1 cup Greek-style yogurt
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• Juice of 2 lemons
• 4 tablespoons grated ginger root
• 6 cloves of garlic, crushed or finely minced
• 1 1/2 tablespoon garam masala (an Indian spice mix that you can buy or make yourself)
• 1 tablespoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt

Pour the marinade over the chicken pieces. Make sure all the pieces are well coated, then cover and refrigerate the chicken for 2-3 hours.

Note:  I don't recommend marinading the small pieces of kabob meat longer than 3 hours because the acid in the lemon and the yogurt will "cook" the tender pieces chemically, making for a strange, too-soft texture in the final dish. If you are using large, bone-in pieces, however, you can marinate the meat overnight with no problem.

A Completely Unnecessary Detour . . .
. . . into DIY Schmaltz

While the meat was soaking up flavor, I took the time to render the fat from the chicken skin (to make crispy treats for my dogs and schmaltz for future recipes--chicken liver pate, perhaps, or matzo ball soup). Obviously, this was not part of Chicken Tikka, so PLEASE SKIP DOWN TO STEP 3 if you just want to know about Chicken Tikka Masala.

This photo section is about chicken skin and schmaltz. Yum!

chicken skin cut into little pieces

fry bits of skin and fat over very low heat

crispy bits

schmaltz

Step 3: Grill or roast the the meat.

Thread the chicken pieces on bamboo skewers that have been soaking in water for at least an hour. Grill or roast until done.

Last weekend, I roasted the chicken in a screaming hot (475 degrees Fahrenheit) oven for about 40 minutes, turning the pieces over once, about halfway through. This was the result:

Legs and wings (in the back) ended up as appetizers.  The kabob meat was removed from the bamboo skewers and set aside for the masala.

Step 4: Make the Masala

For the sauce, I was inspired by a recipe for Chicken Tikka Masala by Grace Parisi on the Food & Wine website. I used some of her ingredients, but not all. This decision was (or, rather, these decisions were) based solely on how closely I thought the ingredients matched the flavors I remember in the last Chicken Tikka Masala that I had, which was from a Cleveland area restaurant.

Fry together until the onions are translucent:

• 2 tablespoons vegetable oil or ghee
• 1 large onion, finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger

Add spices and fry for another minute

• 1 1/2 tablespoons garam masala
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1 teaspoon of ground allspice
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon cardamom

Add and simmer for 30 minutes:

• 1 28-ounce can crushed tomatoes
• 1 cup heavy cream

FINALLY, add the chicken tikka meat that was removed from the skewers after oven-roasting or grilling. Simmer the sauce a few more minutes to heat the chicken through.

Serve over steamed rice. Garnish with cilantro.

This was DELICIOUS. The texture and density of the sauce was perfect. My only complaint--and it's a very minor complaint--is that the sauce was a little too acidic/tomato-y. I don't know if that was because of the brand of tomatoes I used or if I had too much tomato as compared to cream. If I change anything, it will be to adjust the tomato-to-cream radio.