Restaurant Style Indian Butter Chicken (Chicken Makhani)

"My friends always ask me to make them my Butter Chicken (Chicken Makhani) when I invite them over for dinner! It's *SO* good that I have stopped ordering it at Indian Restaurants! I use a few drops of liquid smoke to give it a 'tandoori' flavour, and don't skip the dried fenugreek leaves. They are what make it taste as though it's from your favourite curry house! UPDATE: One individual has complained that there is excess chili powder in this recipe. It may be that North American chili powder has less heat? Certainly do not omit this ingredient. I used the usual 'chili powder' found at North American grocery stores, the generic type often used in Chili Con Carne. (I hope this clarifies any confusion!)"
 
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photo by eabeler photo by eabeler
photo by eabeler
photo by eabeler photo by eabeler
photo by eabeler photo by eabeler
photo by ms.susan photo by ms.susan
photo by ms.susan photo by ms.susan
Ready In:
6hrs 30mins
Ingredients:
26
Serves:
4
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ingredients

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directions

  • To Marinade: Place cubed chicken in a nonporous bowl with yogurt, lemon juice, chili powder,salt and liquid smoke. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
  • Mix in garlic, garam masala, butter, chili powder, ginger paste, lemon juice and oil. Replace cover and refrigerate to marinate for another 3 to 4 hours.
  • Preheat oven to 400°F (200°C).
  • Place chicken on an oven sheet and bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes.
  • To Make Sauce: Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Stir in 1 tbsp garam masala. When masala begins to puff and bubble, mix in ginger, garlic paste and green chile peppers. Saute 5 minutes, then stir in tomato puree, tomato paste, chili powder, salt, 1/2 tbsp garam masala and a couple more drops of liquid smoke. Bring to a boil; reduce heat to low and simmer, stirring in honey, fenugreek and cream.
  • Place cooked chicken in sauce mixture. Simmer on medium-low heat for about an hour or until liquid is reduced by 1/3.
  • Salt to taste and garnish with fresh chopped cilantro (optional).
  • Enjoy!

Questions & Replies

  1. Why Don't you add onion or onion paste as Indian food is incomplete without onions???
     
  2. Ingredients states crushed tomatoes but directions stated tomato purée. Which one is best for a success? Thank you. Looking forward to trying this!
     
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Reviews

  1. This is seriously good stuff! A few observations:<br/>Be careful with the liquid smoke, it can easily overpower the dish.<br/>When you simmer the sauce, be careful not too reduce it too much, or it will become a bit too red and "tomato'y". Butter Chicken should be a nice orange color.<br/><br/>Here's a tip I picked up with a Tikka Masalas recipe as far as the chicken goes:<br/>Thread the cut chicken pieces onto some pre-soaked bamboo skewers to marinade. This makes getting the pieces out of the marinade much easier and less messy. I like to char broil my chicken a bit, too.<br/><br/>You will need to go to an Indian grocery store for the fenugreek leaves though. Standard grocery stores will not carry them. Do NOT use seeds instead of leaves! Fenugreek seeds are very bitter whereas the leaves are more sweet.
     
  2. First you need to know that my wife and I are food snobs. We can't stomach second rate food. Having said that..., THIS is the BEST butter chicken recipe we've ever encountered and we've tried a few of them. It really does taste as good as the best Indian restaurants make it and you will NOT be disappointed! There is no need to look any further. This is it! Enjoy!
     
  3. Made this for dinner tonight. We've tried a number of the different Butter Chicken recipes floating around... wow do they vary. This was, hands-down, the very very best. Better than restaurant quality. When I was prepping I had the time so I marinated the chicken overnight. I also second the note from another reviewer to be careful not to over-reduce the sauce or it changes color; that happened to me. It still tasted fantastic, but in it's last 5 minutes of simmering went from the mellow orange of Butter Chicken to being a touch too red.
     
  4. I have made this many times and each time it has turned out fantastic. I use the Onken full fat natural set yogurt and it never turns out grainy. The only thing that I have added is coconut cream for the kids sake as they would only eat korma but they love this as it's very similar. I usually made a lot more of the marinade and freeze it as it can be used to marinate lots of things even if you're not doing a curry. I love it. Thank you so much for the recipe, it will be passed on to my children when they are old enough to cook themselves. It's already passed to my daughter in law. I also used smoked paprika instead of liquid smoke. Not so overpowering. Dee Johnson, Dundee, United Kingdom.
     
  5. This is just what I was looking for! Tastes like my favorite restaurant. The key to the correct flavor was the fenugreek leaves. Thank you so much.
     
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Tweaks

  1. Prevent yogurt from curdling, a couple of tips. 1. instead of dumping lemon juice into yogurt and stirring, add small amounts of yogurt to the lemon juice and whisk thoroughly (similar to tempering egg mixture for custard) 2. make sure you are using FULL FAT yogurt or greek yogurt 3. whisk in a stabilizer in your yogurt (chick pea flour, cornstarch, regular white wheat flour) before adding lemon juice. 4. when you add the yogurt to the rest of the ingredients, slowly increase the sauce, whisking often to catch any curdles (after doing at least one of the above steps).
     
  2. Ground fenugreek as I couldn't get leaves and added petals creamed coconut. Everything else was as per recipe.
     
  3. This was delicious! I didn't have liquid smoke on hand, and I subbed dried celery for the fenugreek leaves.<br/>My only issue, while it didn't effect the taste, the method for cooking the chicken caused the yogurt marinade to curdle which didn't look so great once added to the curry sauce. But the chicken was so tender and it all tasted delicious!
     
  4. This is seriously good stuff! A few observations:<br/>Be careful with the liquid smoke, it can easily overpower the dish.<br/>When you simmer the sauce, be careful not too reduce it too much, or it will become a bit too red and "tomato'y". Butter Chicken should be a nice orange color.<br/><br/>Here's a tip I picked up with a Tikka Masalas recipe as far as the chicken goes:<br/>Thread the cut chicken pieces onto some pre-soaked bamboo skewers to marinade. This makes getting the pieces out of the marinade much easier and less messy. I like to char broil my chicken a bit, too.<br/><br/>You will need to go to an Indian grocery store for the fenugreek leaves though. Standard grocery stores will not carry them. Do NOT use seeds instead of leaves! Fenugreek seeds are very bitter whereas the leaves are more sweet.
     

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