Hi all,
Most recipes and videos I have seen online start with a yogurt based marinade for the chicken. The chicken is then “seared”, removed from the pan, rest of sauce built up and chicken returned to finish cooking.
My issue here is that you cannot really sear wet stuff in a pan. So that chicken, covered in yogurt marinade will not really sear (even if you shake off the excess). You basically get a braising conditions in the pan. This probably DOES work in a grill as the marinade simply drips into the coals and burns but not in a pan.
So the question is:
- Wouldn’t it be better to dry rub the chicken so it could be seared and simply use the yogurt (and rtest of wet ingredients for the marinade) as a deglacing liquid after wards?
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Butter chicken is one of our family’s favorites. The recipe we use ([gift link](Enjoy this complimentary ATK recipe—no login required—for the next 30 days. https://www.americastestkitchen.com/recipes/11519-indian-butter-chicken-murgh-makhani?gifted_recipe=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzdHJhcGlJZCI6Ijk5NCIsImlhdCI6MTc3MzQyMzU0NCwiZXhwIjoxNzc2MDE1NTQ0fQ.--AlhoRhr84gwtLHEZsugAgHB7R7K2R-DZOPZh21SZA)) has a couple of noteworthy features:
- The yogurt isn’t really a marinade, there is no “marinating” time. The chicken is coated with yogurt and cooked immediately. The notes explain that this is a strategy to enchance browning and to imitate a tandoor.
- The chicken is cooked on a wire rack under the broiler. Under those conditions, plenty of searing / charring is possible. We also do this on a grill when the weather is agreeable, and that also works, as you predicted.
We’ve had butter chicken at restaurants that was better than what we make at home. And we’ve had butter chicken at restaurants that was nowhere near as good as what we make at home.
Awesome, thanks for the valuable reply!
The idea that you can’t brown it but can deglaze with it makes me think your yogurt is way more watery than any I’m familiar with.
When my family makes butter chicken, we use yogurt that would stick to a spoon turned upside down, let alone coat the back of one. It dries out and browns just fine.
(Disclaimer: I’m a white American who knows next to nothing about Indian food, so I could be using a very Americanized recipe or otherwise doing it wrong.)
I think another commenter made a similar point, but I would think yogurt actually helps with browning the chicken. It’s less fatty than mayo, but I’m thinking of mayo slathers that people put on chickens where the fat actually browns more effectively than the straight chicken. If your marinade is super runny, you might have a watery yogurt and can try straining it before making the marinade.
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When I get butter chicken from a restaurant, there’s a bit of a smoky flavour in the chicken and it makes me suspect they just blast all their chicken in the tandoor and drop it in sauce to order. When I make it at home, it tastes completely different but the process is like what you said. However, my “Indian” cookbook seems to be pretty regionally oriented.
But that’s pure supposition.
I agree with your observations 100%.
In a tandoor or grill, the sauce would drip and NOT get the chicken soggy but that’s impossible in a pan (even cast iron) which is why I am looking at this alternative approach
I will most likely give this a try tomorrow with the “new” technique to get some actual sear… I’ll post my notes here
Thanks for your reply
Makes sense, try it and see. You’ll end up with much crisper meat than usual which may be better or worse. Another option would be to marinade in yogurt, but wipe it off before searing, then using the marinade to start the sauce.
This is why I am asking… I have a pretty solid recipe and last I made it, the whole searing issue hit me so I wrote alternative instructions the made more sense to actual get a sear.
I will try it tomorrow unless a comment here convinces me it’s a bad idea.
For example, you are correct in that I may end up with crispy meat which I don’t think it’s a great idea for this dish. However, I can always stop searing before a full crust forms, just some nice fondant. I believe the entire point is just to reduce some of those flavours so the sauce is more complex.
On that note, I always sear beef when I do stew, the entire sear/crust/fondant just melts into the sauce so the meat is never crispy in the end but the sauce is nicer for it.
Thanks for your feedback. Whatever I decide for tomorrow, I will post feedback here after the fact
Yeah, you’re right about searing beef for stew, so this might end up the same. I think it would depend on how much you cook the chicken on its own compared to how long it cooks in the sauce. Like if you completely cook the chicken then add it to the sauce, you will definitely have crispier chicken. Like chicken in mole sauce. If you just get it a bit brown but still raw inside, you’ll probably have softer meat which will be closer to the ideal for this dish. I’m not really sure where the correct cut over point is, but I’m curious. Please post any results you get, this is exactly the kind of thing I tend to mess around with when reading recipes.