Cook, eat and be happy……..

I’m always happy when I cook chicken. The options are plenty and we love chicken. In fact, most of us do. Chicken can be grilled, tava fried, a nice curry, fried and even roasted. This particular roast with sweet potatoes is tasty, easy to make and doubles up as a filling for a katti roll, or can be served as short -eats, in fact a main dish too. With the use of simple Indian spices all available in every kitchen you can whip up a dish which is both awesome in flavour and taste.

At home, if it’s one protein I pick up every week without fail, it’s chicken – could be boneless, mince, curry Cut and now you have the biriyani cut which is ideal for tava grill. I also pick up the whole chicken for a simple Sunday roast. At any given point of time, there’s always a dish of chicken and a dish of paneer- in the fridge. That’s how much we love our chicken and paneer.

I’m always on the look out for new recipes to try out- various permutations and combinations. Some click and some don’t. Letting you into a small family secret, when we visit a restaurant for the first time, if the food is not spot on and not value for money, it’s a one time visit. That’s it. No questions asked.

Sharing with you a recipe I learnt at the first cooking class I attended. The only change is I’ve substituted potato for sweet potato.

Ingredients

• Chicken -1 kg
• Sweet potato -250 GMs or 2 medium
• Onions -2
• Dry red chillies -5-6
• Ginger- garlic paste -2 tbsp
• Green chillies slit 4-5
• Curry leaves
• Kashmiri chilli powder -2tbsp
• Garam masala -1 tbsp( Eastern/ Kitchen Treasures)
• Chicken masala -2 tbsp ( Eastern/ Kitchen Treasures)
• Salt
• Oil
• Ghee/ coconut oil -2tbsp

For garnishing – Onions -2 ( sliced fine and fried till brown)

Method:

• Wash and cut the chicken into bite size pieces, clean and keep aside.
• Peel and cut sweet potato into small cubes.
• Heat a little oil, add the dry red chillies and the sliced onions. Fry till brown.
• Add the ginger garlic paste and the slit chillies and fry well
• Add the spice powders, a little turmeric too and a little water and fry well.
• Add the chicken and sweet potato cubes and fry till well blended. Add salt.
• On a high flame stir fry the whole mixture for a few minutes to seal all the juices. (4-5 minutes)
• Lower the flame, sprinkle 1-2 tbsp of water and cover.
• The chicken should cook on a low flame.
• Remove the cover and dry up any remaining liquid.
• Keep it on a low flame till the whole dish turns brown and dry.
• Add 2 tbsp of ghee or coconut oil and let the chicken roast on a low flame.
• Check for salt.
• Garnish with fried onions and serve with parathas or even Puttu.

Chefs tips :

• The weight of the chicken should not be more than one kg.
• Chicken should be cut into small pieces to facilitate uniform cooking.
• If serving this dish as short eats/ snacks you should pick up boneless chicken.
• When cooking, use a non- stick pan or dish as the water used is minimum – this is just to avoid sticking to the base.
• Chicken can be substituted for beef or mutton.
• You could also make a katti roll using boneless chicken.
• This serves 8-10.

Till my next post,

Cheers

Rose