Mangalorean Chicken Ghee Roast : A favorite at home

Mangalorean Chicken Ghee Roast is an absolute favourite at home. The child can eat it three times a day for months without asking for “what else”. That alone makes it a winner in my view!

Chicken Ghee Roast was the first Mangalorean dish I fell in love with and it has been a long love affair since then. The beauty of Mangalorean food is in its simplicity yet a fantastic depth of flavour.

I know the idea of Ghee roast is very daunting especially when we look at the amount of ghee that goes into it’s making. But if there is one thing that you need to know about this dish it is “Do not skim on ghee”. Make it less but really don’t say, let me add lesser ghee to it. The dish needs that ghee floating and I swear if someone bottles that ghee and sells I will buy. It is so full of flavour, whether you take a slice of bread to wipe it off the plate or add some rice to finish every drop of it. But don’t let it go waste, the ghosts of ghee roast loving people will come and hound you if you do.

If you make this, share a picture with me on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook? I would love to hear what you have to say about it!

Mangalorean Chicken Ghee Roast : A favorite at home

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Course Main Course, Main Dish

Cuisine Mangalorean, south indian

Ingredients

  

• 1 kg chicken
• 1/2 cup ghee *read notes*
• 2 tsp jaggery
• 2 sprigs curry leaves

For the marinade

• 1 lemon juice
• 2/3 cup curd
• 1 tsp turmeric powder
• Salt to taste

For the masala (to be ground)

• 10 Kashmiri chillies *read notes*
• 8 Kumti/Bedgi chillies
• 6-8 peppercorns
• 1 tbsp coriander seeds
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds jeera
• 1/4 tsp fenugreek seeds methi
• 12 garlic cloves
• 1 marble size tamarind soaked in 2 spoons of water

Instructions

 

• Marinade the chicken with curd, salt and turmeric and keep aside for at least an hour. Overnight is the best.
• In a flat pan over low heat, dry roast all the masala ingredients apart from tamarind and garlic. Roast till the spices are fragrant and slightly browned. Set aside for cooling. This will take about 4-5 minutes on low flame but please be mindful to not burn the spices.
• Once the spices are cool, grind to a smooth paste along with garlic and soaked tamarind paste. Keep aside.
• In a kadhai, heat half of the ghee (1/4 cup) and add marinated chicken to it. Cook till chicken till half done. This should take about 5-6 minutes. Remove the chicken pieces and boil the curd mixture till it reduced half and thickened. Set aside.
• In a separate kadhai, heat the other 1/4 cup of ghee. Add the ground masala, jaggery and curry leaf. On slow flame, roast the masala till the ghee separates. On low flame this will take 10-12 minutes, please be patient with this step. Add chicken and the curd gravy and cook it chicken is fully done and the masala thick.
• Add more ghee if you want and serve hot with neer dosa, parota or just a glass of chilled beer

Notes

1. Don't hesitate in the use of ghee here, 1/2 cup is the least you should use. Add more if you want but don't reduce it
2. Add or reduce the chillies according to how spicy you want the dish. More often than not, I use all chillies as Kashmiri chillies. That gives it a lovely red color and keeps the spice level in check

Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!