Chicken korma
Been making a lot of indian curries recently. It's been a couole of years since I last made chicken korma and I remember back then the recipe I used was very basic and simple.
This time I spent a lot of time researching the recipe, looking at different variations, regional differences, the history of the dish and while also trying to justify why certain things are done in a scientific way.
Then I tabulated my findings and created one recipe out of all of them. I can't really claim credit for my recipe nor do I know if my recipe is even authentic. All I know if that is was delicious and the chicken came out insanely tender.
I'll comment the recipe below.
16 replies
Solid but maybe pick one or two solid spices for the tadka, and don’t spare anything. I prefer to cook with ghee as the restaurants where I grew up were more Pakistani/Kashmiri style. Actually I don’t think I’ve ever marinated the chicken for a korma as normally you’re cooking it in the sauce rather than separately as in chicken tikka massala, but curious how this changes it.
Yeah for authenticity ghee is probably preferred.
The main reason why I don't use ghee is because I don't cook enough indian food to buy it regularly and I didn't want to commit to an entire jar of it just to make a couple of dishes.
I would say another thing I saw again and again during my research was the insistence of using bone-in chicken. I'm certain it would taste better but I'm too lazy for it 😅
As for the marinading, I would say half the recipes I found marinaded and the other half didn't. From a food science perspective it made sense to me to marinade the chicken. You could experiment with and without and see if there is a significant difference. I didn't feel like it was that much more work for me which is why I marinaded.
Bone-in is always more flavourful, but a pain to eat. Boneless easier to eat, never tastes as good. I like to brown the meat in a pan, bone in first then cook in the marinade. My best results are when using a pressure cooker.
Chicken Korma
Ingredients
For marinade
Rest
Aromatics (optional) (add as many or as few)
Instructions
Indian person checking in. Yep this sounds like a pretty good recipe 🙂
I wouldn't substitute almonds though. The cashews are very important for that very creamy texture!
Also a matter of taste but a little more garlic and ginger wouldn't hurt.
You add yogurt before boiling, and it didn't break?
Not sure what this question means. Could you please clarify?
Also thank you for the affirmation 😃
I think they mean it didn’t curdle. I tend to add the yoghurt toward the end of cooking because of this, particularly if you have lemon or lime in the pot.
Yeah, good call out. Yoghurt based curries its best to bring the yoghurt in last, pre-warm it up to room temperature and cook it gently, no boil. Salt, acid and heat shocks can all curdle the yoghurt.
Oh. No, it didn't curdle.
Non Indian curry lover checking in. Don't kormas usually have a taste of coconut somewhere? Or is that just common rather than a necessary part of the dish.
From my research it is a North indian vs south indian thing.
I chose to build the recipe around the north indian style. I also liked that lactic acid from the yogurt tenderizes the meat from a food science perspective.
Thanks! I might well give this a try!
That’s probably the Aussies. They put coconut in literally everything, and most of the curries here are creamy ones too.
Korma as I know it being a North Indian dish uses yogurt not coconut.
Maybe some South Indian version uses coconut? It's a big diverse country anything is possible.
One thing for certain, you can always have more garlic
Looks good. Saved it to my recipe app to try someday. Thanks!