MEALS & MILES: Dahi Chicken

Dahi Chicken

Yogurt or Dahi is often considered as a digestive aid. It is easily available in any grocery stores or can be made at the home too. Food expert says that yogurt contains proteins, vitamins, calcium blah blah blah and what not .So, what if we can use this “Healthy” stuff to make our chicken curry more delicious and its gravy much thicker. Enough said, now we are going to make “Dahi Chicken” , before that I must tell you that I don’t take any guarantee about the healthiness of this recipe but I am pretty much sure that it will be quite tastyJ.

Ingredients (For 500 grams Chicken):

500 grams of Chicken. You know what to do next, washing and all thing. If you have tried what I did in the the previous recipe, then you will agree the point of washing chicken with turmeric powder.

Washing is important though (It doesn't matter you like it or not)!!

Take 250-300 grams of onion and chop them finely. Please make sure you don’t use too much of onions otherwise the gravy will taste a bit on the sweeter side.

A half cup of yogurt (no matter low fat or high fat, to be very honest I still find it impossible to differentiate between types of yogurt. For me it is either sweet or normal :P).

Ginger and Garlic paste (This time please put in some extra effort. Peel off garlic and ginger and crush them if you don’t have a mixer grinder. If you have one then just peel off the outer skin of ginger). Believe me, this will taste much better than packed ones.

Mustard oil (Nothing taste better than our very own ‘sarso ka tel’.

2 teaspoon Turmeric powder.

Half teaspoon Cumin (Jeera) seeds.

2 teaspoon Coriander (Dhania) powder.

2 teaspoon black pepper (Golki) powder.

2 teaspoon cumin (Jeera) powder.

2 teaspoon Kashmiri mirch powder (for color).

Point to note that if you don’t have the above arsenal then 4-5 teaspoon of ‘chicken or meat masala’ of any brand will do.

Now, Let’s Cook it up!!!!

Heat a frying pan properly. The theory behind this is the same as described in the previous recipe.

Pour mustard oil in it. Don’t add too much oil, 4-5 big spoons will do.

Mustard oil has it own flavor and richness that makes non-veg dishes more tasty.

Add cumin seeds when oil gets heated properly. When cumin seeds start to pop up, add the chopped onions into it.

Salt and onion together and you know why!!!

Add salt to taste. Here we go again. Same drill: - Add as much salt as you need for the whole dish. As explained before.

Sauté the onions for some time. You will see that the onions will start changing its color.

When the onions will turn into light brown color, add the ginger garlic paste.

As i suggested you guys to try making the ginger-garlic paste on your own. But, if you decided to make the dish at 10:00 PM like me then packed paste is the only option you can have :P.

Mix it well with onions and sauté for 5-10 minutes. If you are using the home made paste then you will find the raw smell of the paste disappearing way more quickly than the packed one (As I always say, home-made things rock).

Now is the time to add chicken and mix it well with the mixture of onion and ginger garlic paste.

Mix them well.

Cover the pan with a lid and let the chicken cook for some time.

Let chicken cook slowly on low flame.

Meanwhile, take all the spices mentioned in a bowl or glass and pour yogurt into it. Add a little bit of water and mix it well. Spices should get properly diluted with yogurt and water.

Mix yogurt and the spices together thoroughly. You will need some water too. Make sure that the mixture is not that concentrated.

Check the chicken now, water must have started to separate from it. Now is the time to add the spices into it.

Your chicken is almost 50 percent cooked now. Just have to add spices and let them cook for a bit more.

Mix chicken and spices properly and cover the pan with Lid. Let it cook on low flame for a while. After some time just check to make sure that spices are not sticking to the base of the pan.