This week, Indian food was demystified for myself. The long list of exotic ingredients had intimidated me and I was all too content to simply go out for Indian food instead.
Toronto is very multicultural and one can easily go out and dine any cuisine their heart (and belly) desires. Toronto also has a large southeast Asian population and that means there are many markets catering to these peoples’ culinary tastes.
When preparing Indian food, most of your work will be in amassing the array of spices and herbs used in this old, tried n’ true and delicious cuisine. Some herbs you will find in your pantry like black peppercorns, bay leaves or cloves but then there are other spices like methi leaves, garam masala that might be harder to find where you live.
Meeta of the delicious food blog, “What’s for Lunch Honey” had posted her Butter Chicken dish last year and although I had this dish bookmarked for ages, it’s been only this week since I finally got around to cooking this easy, exotic and delicious dish.
Did I mention this dish is easy? Did I mention it’s delicious?
I must also underline the need to toast your spices and then freshly grind them for the recipe. The “aroma-gasmic” experience I had during this process filled the home with exotic scents, it transported to a far, far place. Grinding the spices was like a Tsunami of olfactory unami.
I made this dish on two occasions and I prepared it in two different ways:
- You can prepare Butter Chicken in the oven as Meeta recommends and;
- You can prepare the dish on your stove-top, placing a lid on your skillet to simmer the sauce and render the chicken to fork-tender.
Some of you may associate Indian food with being spicy and it is but many confuse the word spicy with hot. Indian food is spicy and some dishes are in fact hot but this particular Butter Chicken dish as a mild type of heat that enhances the flavour of the dish, not bury it.
So, make a shopping list and grab these ingredients. Your southeast Asian stores will carry the more exotic ingredients and some of the supermarkets will have all the ingredients in the international aisle of the store.
Meeta’s site is chock-full of delicious dishes ranging from Indian to Continental European, from savory to sweet. She has something for everybody.
If you are not reading this post in a feed reader or at https://kalofagas.ca then the site you are reading is illegally publishing copyrighted material. Contact me at truenorth67 AT gmail DOT COM. All recipes, text and photographs in this post are the original creations & property of the author.
© 2007-2009 Peter Minakis
37 Responses
Wow peter you have out done yourself.
This looks exqusite.
I am sure going to meeta’s place to print the recipe too.
Just superb this is looking.
Delicious Peter and I totally agree with you about Meeta’s blog and recipes! She’s wonderful. Bring on the spices I say.
Butter Chicken is my absolute favorite Indian dish (I ate it many times in India back in August). I’ll have to try this version!
Looks delicious Peter. I have this one bookmarked and have wanted to make it for a while…
Peter, you should be proud of yourself;your murgh makhani looks great :-)
what a fragrant dish! It looks so scrumptious!
Cheers,
Rosa
Peter I am just coming from Meetas place, yours look darker did you do something special or add more spices etc…
Looks delicious. I have to try your recipe.
Also, I cannot express enough gratitude for pointing out the difference between spicy and hot. Most westerners just assume spicy=hot and deprive themselves of a sensory adventure.
great point about the spicy and hot thing in Indian food. People think everything is fire engine crazy hot and it just is not.
Oooh I am so pleased you’ve done an Indian dish – this looks really good.
Off to Meeta’s now!
love butter chicken! love scooping up that sauce with bread. mmmm
Some spices used in East Indian cooking have been a mystery, but our markets are becoming more and more diviersified. This butter chicken does look comorting Peter.
I so love Indian food!! And like you Peter, I was the same when I first started cooking Indian food. And now, when I look back think how silly I was for thinking I couldn’t cook it but it does help to get advice (which I did……some Indian cooking classes with tips). I use the spices in other ethnic dishes as they cross over well with Chinese, Thai etc.
this has made me very hungry – maybe my weekend project…
Wow, this looks wonderful, especially now that it’s cooler and I’m starting to look making more comfort foods.
Nice.
This is one of the top Indian dishes we’d like to try. It seems easy and very flavorful.
Peter, with words like ‘aroma-gasmic’ you made my day. I’m sitting at home and can feel it. :) I love this dish but never made it. Because of you I’ll enter the World of aroma-gasmic pretty soon.
This is one of my favorite dishes! I can’t wait to try it!
Great dish. Indian cuisine is lovely and there are yet some spices I need to find but garam massala is very easy to make yourself.
WOW! Great dish Peter. I love indian food and Meeta’s blog is a great source of recipes. Most spices I can easily find in Greece, so cooking indian was never problem. The shopping list can be daunting though…
aroma-gasmic. that one’s going into the day-to-day vocabulary. :)
lovely, saucy, fragrant dish, peter. glad to see you mixing it up a bit!
Nice looking butter chicken. Butter chicken is certainly one of my favorite Indian dishes. I will have to try the baked version.
This looks so delicious Peter! I saw a recipe for butterchicken somewhere else this week as well and I was already thinking then how tempting this is. I love Indian food!
A great plate ! A real temptation !
I did a double take when I saw this post! You doing Indian? Wow! But it looks like a fantastic recipe.
I am glad you posted this as I have been looking for a good butter chicken recipe. I think I have all the spices I need so this should be easy like you said.
Oooh I love butter chicken! I am in total agreement about toasting and grinding the spices too, it makes such a difference. I find the smell almost intoxicating when I am pounding them in the pestle and mortar.
Meeta’s recipes are always inviting and not intimidating, even for those of us who are not expert at Indian cooking. Great photos, Peter.
Oh Peter…
butter chicken! peter!!! you’ve gone to the dark side and did a non-greek dish! kidding… this really looks awesome and i still feel very intimidated by cooking indian at home. plus my fave place up the street is cheaper than cooking at home, so we never do.
My husband, who didn’t cook, decided, once he decided he was going to start to cook, that he wanted to cook Indian food. So he did. I suppose that if you are starting from scratch it really doesn’t matter much what you learn to cook and he loves Indian food so…
I’ve sent him to this recipe (if he doesn’t already have it.) I have a feeling it will be gracing our table soon. Thanks so much for the referral!
You know that I am just a happy gal knowing it was me getting you to try this out. My truest wish however – if we could have cooked this together. Maybe oe day we can do a Greek-Indian cooking fiesta together. Glad you and your family liked this!
The signature dish to the Indian cuisine & you have done a fantastic job Peter!
Wow this looks super delish. My friend used to make a killer butter chicken. I must try this recipe!
This looks mouthwateringly good and I am heading over to Meeta’s site to see some more of her recipes.
I love the way the house smells when I cook Indian cusine.It looks so savory and wonderful. I know I have all the ingrediants so I need to whip this up.
I love Indian food, and this looks amazing! I can’t wait to make it myself…