Chicken Chettinad Curry is the peppery, hot and delicious chicken curry from the land of Chettiyars, the trading community of India. The Chettinad Chicken has a unique flavour profile, it is bursting with flavours of stout goontur chiles, black pearl-like whole peppercorns and plenty of red onion. Roasting, grinding, sautéing are the basic rituals of making an Indian chicken curry, still, each curry has a distinctive toothsome taste to it.
The process of making Chicken Chettinad is also no different but it is the appetizing combination of flavours, which leaves a long-lasting impression on the palate. Chettinad Cuisine has its own set of cooking tricks and tales and an untold saga of key ingredients for the novice cook like me. One day while on a mission to find some cooking tips online on the said cuisine, an online bookselling portal guided me to the page of ‘the Bangala Table – flavours and recipes from Chettinad.’ The cover page was fascinating enough to immediately add it to the shopping cart and a few days later it was on my bookshelf sharing space with our cookbooks.
With eager thoughts while turning pages of the newly acquired cookbook I landed upon the recipe of Chicken Chettinad Pepper Masala. The inception of the recipes says, “ This is really the flag bearer of the Chettinad food and to a degree, Indian food recipes. If there is one dish that people around India and the World know of Chettinad Cuisine, Chicken Chettinad Pepper Masala is it!” The next moment roasting and grinding of masala begins, toned down the spice level of the curry by reducing the number of goontur red chilies to almost half, rest naively followed the recipe and very soon the air in the house was filled with the aroma of the simmering Chettinad masala.
Though I do have a fair understanding of Chettinad flavors but nothing prepared me for the feast of the senses that awaited on the dining table. Served Chicken Chettinad Pepper Masala along with Tomato and Garlic Rasam, Coin Paratha and Steamed Rice, it was the kind of lunch menu which evoked the memories of formative years in Chennai.
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Chicken Chettinad Recipe
Ingredients
- 500 gram chicken cut into curry size pieces
- one 2 inch piece of cinnamon
- 2 green cardamom pods crushed
- 2 large-size onion fine chopped
- 2 large size tomato pureed
- salt to taste
- 4 tablespoon cooking oil
- 3 - 4 curry leaves
Ingredients For The Masala:
- 1 teaspoon fennel seeds
- 2 teaspoon black peppercorns
- 1 teaspoon cumin seeds
- 4 dried red chilies esp goondu milagai variety
- 1 teaspoon coriander seeds
- ½ teaspoon turmeric powder
- 2 teaspoon ginger garlic paste
Instructions
- To prepare Chettinad Chicken, first clean, wash and pat dry the chicken pieces with a kitchen towel. Keep aside covered in a bowl.
- Dry roast fennel seeds, black pepper, cumin, red chilies, coriander seeds till fragrant and slightly darkened. Grind them in a mixer to a smooth paste using little water.
- Add turmeric and ginger - garlic paste to the freshly grind spice mix. Stir to combine and set aside in a bowl.
- Heat oil in a large kadhai (Buy it here) over medium heat. Add the cinnamon, cardamom pods, curry leaves and saute for few seconds till fragrant. Add the chopped onion and saute over low heat till onion is light brown in color.
- Next add the tomato puree and fry the masala for 10 minutes or so over low heat. The indication of masala being ready is oil starts separating from it.
- Now add the fresh spice paste to the kadhai and stir to combine. Continue to saute the masala scraping the bottom of the kadhai, till the masala takes deep brown color and nicely roasted.
- At this stage add the chicken pieces, salt and stir coat the chicken pieces with the spice mixture. Add 1 - 2 cups of warm water, stir to combine and bring to a boil on high heat. Turn the heat to low and cook the chicken chettinad curry covered for 15 - 20 minutes, stirring occasionally in between.
- Once the chicken is cooked, remove the lid and let the chicken simmer over medium heat to thicken the gravy. Turn off the heat.
- Serve Chicken Chettinad Curry with steamed rice, Tomato and Garlic Rasam (see recipe here) or lachha paratha.
5 comments
Can’t stop drooling at that chatti of curry… Looks so rich and delicious…
WOW! This is a great stop for me here and I am now just continuously staring at the wonderful captures you took that of my favorite curry. Thanks a lot Hina 🙂
Thank you. I will certainly try this tomorrow for lunch
It came out DELICIOUS
Came out DELICIOUS