Chicken Tikka Kebab in Wooden Skewers (Microwave and Tawa version)

Chicken Tikka Kebab is one of those items which I make sure that I eat whenever I get the chance to order the starter J. I just blindly love it and I am sure, many of you love this too. Today, I am presenting the authentic Chicken Tikka Kebab Recipe in pictorial format. I have made it both in microwave and tawa, so if you do not have a microwave, not to worry, there is a tawa version too.

Chicken Tikka Kebab

Ingredients: 

Part 1# Bone less chicken cubes 15-18 pieces. Capsicum, tomatoes (remove the pulp) and onions cut into cubes.

Fresh vegetables cut in cubes

Part 2# 2 tbsp gram flour, 1 tbsp butter, 5 tbsp curd, 1 tbsp ginger garlic chilli paste, 1 tsp aamchur powder, salt to taste, turmeric powder and food colour.

Part 3# Coriander, saunf, black pepper, cloves, cumin, cardamom. All whole spices roasted and made into powder.

Part 4# Butter and lemon juice 2 tbsp. Wooden skewers as per need.

Stage 1 # Take all the ingredients except Part # 1 in a bowl, mix it well. Then add all the ingredients of Part 1 # and mix all very well so that every chicken piece gets coated with the masala and the vegetables too. Refrigerate for minimum 2- 5 hours. If possible, do it for overnight.

Marinate the chicken atleast for 2 - 5 hours.

Stage 2 # In a bottle put the wooden skewers and fill it up with normal water. Keep the skewers soaked in it for atleast 30 minutes, no harm if you overdo it.

Soak for minimum 30 minutes.

Stage 3 # Take out the refrigerated chicken. Add the lemon juice and mix it well. Keep it in the room temperature for atleast 30 minutes.

Add lemon juice after taking the chicken out from fridge and keep it in room temperature for atleast 30 minutes.

Stage 4 # Take a skewer, pin up a capsicum piece, then onion, then tomato and then finally a chicken piece. Repeat the process for three times so that a single stick contains three to four pieces of chicken and other vegetables. Apply the same procedure for all the wooden skewers.

Arrange the chicken pieces and vegetables in the skewers.

Stage 5 #

Microwave Mode: Take the microwave grill plate and grease it with some butter. Put up the kebab sticks carefully one by one. Put the whole grill plate on a microwave safe plate so that the juices coming out from the kebab do not make your microwave dirty.

Put it in the microwave and cook it in full power for 10 minutes. Then set it in microwave and grill combination mode and cook for another 20 minutes. Do not forget to turn those over in between and to add some butter.

Microwave Mode

Tawa Mode: Take a flat pan which has a proper lid, apply some butter. Place the pan on the gas, arrange the sticks in it but make sure that you do not over crowd it. Cover the pan. Turn on the flame and keep it in the low flame. Let it remain like this for atleast 10 minutes. Then turn it over and apply some butter on the kebabs and close the lid once again and let it cook for another 15-20 minutes on the lowest flame.

Tawa Mode

P.s It is a old pic, so pardon me for being not specific.

Take it out and serve hot with some chutney or sauce J

Chicken Tikka Kebab

Chicken Tikka Kebab in Wooden Skewers

Kolkata Style Easy Chicken Aloo Biriyani

I know a lot of people who can think of no other dish other than Biriyani when they go to any restaurant and yes, they never get tired of eating it. My family contains those people and they are completely mad about Biriyani.  I have made Biriyani at home for several times and believe me it is a real simple dish if you get the proportions right. Today in my blog, I am posting my easy Chicken Aloo Biriyani or as they say, Kolkata Biriyani in pictorial format so that you can easily make it at any weekend and give your family and friends a surprise treat.

Kolkata Style Easy Chicken Aloo Biriyani

Ingredients: 

Part 1# 4 potatoes cut into two pieces, 2 tbsp ghee for frying it, turmeric for the colour and salt for taste.

Part 2# 12 medium chicken pieces, 6 chopped onion, 2 tbsp ginger garlic paste, 1 tbsp chilli paste, 1 tbsp kashmiri mirch, 4 tbsp curd, whole garam masala, 1 tsp coriander powder, 2 tsp garam masala powder, 1 bay leaf, 4 tbsp salt (keep the amount of the salt high as it will mix up with the rice), turmeric, 1 tsp sugar, food colour (optional), 2 tbsp mustard oil for marination.

Part 3# Long grain basmati rice 625 gm, a hand full of whole garam masala, 2 bay leaves, 1 tsp sugar, salt, turmeric. 

Part 4# Kewra water, rose water and mitha attar. Garam masala powder (home made). Ghee.

The utensil I use for making Biriyani is a big microwave safe bowl with lid. If you are planning to make it in gas only, then you can replace it with a handi with a proper lid.

Chicken Biriyani

Stage 1# In a bowl take , 2 tbsp ginger garlic paste, 1 tbsp chilli paste, 1 tbsp kashmiri mirch, 4 tbsp curd, 1 tsp coriander powder, 2 tsp garam masala powder, 1 bay leaf, 1 tbsp salt, turmeric, food colour and mustard oil. Mix it properly and then add the well cleaned chicken pieces. Mix well so that all the chicken pieces gets covered with the masala. Close the lid and marinate for at least 30 minutes.

Marinate the chicken

Stage 2# Boil the whole potatoes with a pinch of salt. Make sure that you do not over boil it. After it’s done properly, take it out from the pressure cooker and cut it into 2 pieces. In a pan add 2 tbsp of ghee, after it turns hot, add the potatoes with some salt and turmeric powder. Saute it for some minutes but do not overdo it otherwise it will ruin the texture of the potatoes. Take it off from the pan and keep it separately.

Boil fry and keep those aside

Stage 3# Add some ghee and refined oil in a pan and after it becomes hot, add the chopped onions. Add some whole garam masala, sugar and salt to it and keep it cooking until it becomes soft and brownish pink. After it gets the desired colour, take out 1/4^th portion of it and keep it aside.

Keep a portion separated for later use

Stage 4# make the space among the remained onion in the pan and add some more refined oil into it. After the oil becomes hot, add the marinated chicken into it. Add the remaining salt. Cook it in medium flame for 15- 20 minutes, stir in between and cover it the rest of time. No need of adding water, but if you feel the need, add some but not much because we don’t want a smashed chicken inside the Biriyani. Keep on cooking it until it gets the desired thickness (follow the picture below). Add the sugar and cook for 5 minutes more and then turn the heat off.

Cook the chicken untill it gets the desired thickness as per the image

Stage 5# In a handi boil some water with a hand full of whole garam masala, 2 bay leaves, 1 tsp sugar, salt, turmeric. After the water starts boiling, add the basmati rice. Check in between so that the rice does not get over cooked. Cook it 80%. After that, remove it from flame and drain the water. Keep the rice in a big flat pan in open air so that the moisture vanishes.

Boil it 80% along with the spices

Stage 6# Take the microwave safe bowl, grease it with 1 tsp of ghee, lay down a bay leaf. Take some rice and make a layer on it. Now add two chicken pieces and one potato with some gravy. Make another thin layer of rice and add 1 tsp rose water, ½ tsp kewra water, 1 drop of mitha attar, 1 tsp ghee, ½ tsp garam masala, 1 tsp fried onions. Close the layer with another layer of rice. Repeat. Repeat and repeat until the bowl gets full and all the rice and chicken gets vanished. If you see that one bowl is not enough, take another microwave safe bowl and follow the before mentioned procedure. 

Create the layers

Stage 7# After you have done the top layer, add all the remaining fried onions, 2 tbsp of ghee, 2 tsp of rose water, 1 tsp of kewra water, 3 drops of mitha attar and 2 tsp of garam masala powder. Make sure that there is atleast 1 inch gap between the last layer and the lid. Close the lid and shake everything a bit. Put the microwave safe bown in the microwave and cook it for 5 minutes. 

The top layer

Bring it out from the microwave and serve hot with any side dish such as dahi mutton, kadhai chicken, chicken rezala etc.

Kolkata Style Biriyani

Chicken Aloo Biriyani

Steamed Chicken Momo

Me and my mom's favorite street food is Steamed Chicken Momo, oh we so love it !! It is healthy and yummy both. We love the steamed version more than the fried one. I made Chicken Momo once in my home, maa loved it. So I repeated and made it once again. 

Steamed Chicken Momo

Ingredients: Flour, boiled boneless chicken, spring onion, onion, 2 tsp fried garlic,  salt, black pepper, little amount of oil, chilli and yes, thats it :)

Step 1# Make a dough using flour, salt, warm water and refined oil. Made the dough very soft and form small balls from it. Cover the balls with a damp cloth for 20 minutes.

Step 2#  In a bowl take the boiled chicken and smash it using a spoon.  Add salt, black pepper, fried garlic, chopped chilli, chopped onion and chopped spring onion. Mix them well.

Step 3# Take the balls and make small rotis out of them. Fill them with the chicken mixture and give it a shape of momo.

Stem 4# Now comes the tipe of steaming those cute little momos. I used my rice cooker to steam it, previously I used to use Idli maker. I just brushed the rice cooker steaming surface with a little oil and placed those cute bombs on it. 

Raw Momos

After 10 minutes of steaming, it gets ready to be served hot with soup or sauce. I preferred sauce so I served with it.

Chicken Dum Pulao

Today I will share a very easy yet tasty meal recipe. That is Chicken Dum Pulao.

 The ingredients are always available in the kitchen and the cooking process is also very simple. I have tried to capture the image of every step so that you do not get confused with the recipe. Here I present the recipe in pictorial format :

Ingredients: 500 gm basmati rice, 12-15 medium peices of chicken, 3 big potatoes cut into 6 pieces, bay leaf, whole garam masala, big elaichi, whole coriander and cumin, saunf, dried red chilli, green chilli, refined oil, lemon, resins, onion, ginger garlic paste, salt, turmeric, curd.

Washed potatoes

Garlic Paste

Ginger paste

Whole cumin

Salt

Turmeric

Washed and soaked Basmati rice

The raw ingredients

The whole spices

 

Add caption

Step 1# Take a pan, heat oil and add the whole spices in it. Fry till they start cracking.

First add the cumin and saute for few minutes until it becomes brown. Then add the other whole spices excluding saunf and coriander. 

Step 2# Now add the chopped onions. Fry them till they become pink and tender. This is very important because this will effect the colour of the pulao. 

Step 3# Now as the onion has become pink to brownish and soft as well, add the ginger and garlic paste now. Keep on frying it in a high flame so that all the things mix up well together and the raw smell vanishes.

Step 4# After all the masala has been mixed well and the raw smell has vanished, add the whole coriander and saunf and mix well.

Step 5# Now when you have added all the spices and they all have turned into a nice brown colour, it is the time that you add the curd. Add the curd along with some salt and turmeric powder. Mix them well and add the washed potatoes and chicken pieces in it. Add the resins. Cook them in a high flame and keep on cooking until the oil starts oozing out. The chicken pieces and potatoes will get mixed with the spices and will absorb the aroma into it. All the ingredients will turn into a nice brown colour all over.

Step 6# Now that oil has started oozing out add the soaked rice carefully so that the grains won't break. Mix them slowly and carefully. Do not mix them a lot otherwise they will break. After cooking like this for 1 to 2 minutes, add water EXACTLY THE DOUBLE OF RICE QUANTITY, here 4 cups as I took 2 cups of rice. Add the lemon pieces too. 

Cook it in a medium flame for 5 minutes keeping the lid open. 

Step 7# Now when you see that the rice along with chicken and potatoes have absorbed the rice to a medium level, sprinkel a table spoon of ghee and cover the pan immediately. In the meanwhile, I had preheated my Iron tawa (you can use clay tawa too). Shift the whole pan on the tawa and cook for 5 to 10 minutes in a medium flame covering the lid.

Step 8# Open the lid and see if there is any remaining water in it, if yes cook it in a high flame opening the lid for few more minutes as per needed. Then turn the heat off and keep the whole thing open for few minutes so the moisture gets absorbed by the air.

Your Chicken Dum Pulao is ready to be served hot with anything of your choice such as Kadhai chicken, doi mutton etc.

Chicken Dum Pulao

Kadhai chicken

There is a story behind me making the Kadhai Chicken. Last month we went for office lunch and had kadhai paneer, everyone loved it as it was finger licking good. Then and there I made my mind of making Kadhai Chicken someday. So here it is, home made yet restaurant taste alike Kadhai Chicken.

Kadhai Chicken

Ingredients: 1 kg medium to large size chicken breast pieces (with bone), 5 medium size onions cut into cube, 2 medium capsicum cut into cube, 2 tomatoes cut into cube, 2 tbsp garlic paste, 2 tsp butter, 1 tsp sugar, 1 tsp chilli paste, 4 tbsp curd, 5 tbsp refined oil, salt, turmeric powder, chopped coriander for garnishing.

Spices-  whole coriander 2 tbsp, whole black pepper 1 tsp , fennel seed 1 tsp, kasuri methi 1 tsp. Roast all these spices and then bled it all together.

Kadhai Chicken

Stage 1# Put a pan on the gas, add the oil and let it become hot. Add half of the onions and the whole amount of capsicum, fry till it in high flame so that the veggies remain crispy, later add half amount of the chopped tomatoes in it and fry for another few minutes and then keep them aside. 

Kadhai Chicken

Stage 2# Now add the remaining onions and saute until they become golden and tender, then add the tomatoes and fry for some more time. Add salt and turmeric powder. Now is the time to add garlic and chilli paste, and saute until the raw smell goes away, then add the curd and the half amount of the spices mixture that you made before hand. Saute it for few more minutes and then add the chicken pieces into it.

Kadhai Chicken

Stage 3# After adding the chicken pieces cook for few minutes in open lid and then add the remaining spices mixture. Close the lid and let it cook in a low flame for next 10 minutes. 

Kadhai Chicken

Stage 4# Open the lid and add water if required ( I did not add water as the curd and the chicken secreted enough water). Wait for few minutes until the water starts drying up. Then add some sugar and the fried onion, capsicum and tomatoes. Saute for few more minutes. and close the lid. After the chicken starts secreting oil add the butter and turn off the flame. Garnish it with some chopped fresh coriander and serve hot.  

Kadhai Chicken Garnished With Fresh Coriander Leaves

P.S#  you can add tomato puree in it to thicken the gravy. :)