Chicken Chettinad | The Novice Housewife

Chicken Chettinad | The Novice Housewife

I am a Sikh and have grown up on north indian cuisine. For a long time my knowledge of cuisines of the southern states of India was limited to dosas and idlis. But it is now slowly growing and some of my favorite dishes come from down south. The use of coconut and curry leaves in a lot of their dishes is what particularly draws me to the cuisine of the south, though the cuisine is not just limited to these two ingredients. The food of the state of Kerala is one of my favorites. Appam and stew, iddiyapams, kerala fish fry is something I could eat any number of times as possible in a week.

I could also eat this chettinad chicken recipe that I am sharing today every week.

Chicken Chettinad | The Novice Housewife

The recipe is from my favorite book on Indian cuisine: India: The Cookbook by Pushpesh Pant.

If there is one Indian book you want in your collection it should be this book.

Pushpesh Pant has written an encyclopedia on Indian cuisine and you can find recipes from all different parts of India. While the steps may sometimes require a little knowledge of indian cooking, the recipes have never disappointed me.

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Growing up I was not fond of Biryani, chicken or vegetarian. I don’t know why but the only rice based dish I liked was rajma chawal. Nothing else. So I avoided biryani and the likes. Of course later things changed but my true love for biryani started on one of my trips to Goa. My brother was posted there. He still is. I know, its awesome! Everyone should have a family member in Goa. It should be the norm.

About 6 years back, my parents and I went to visit my brother and his wife and they kept talking about the Biryani from a place called Anantashram.

They make handi biryani and the biryani is served in the clay pot/ handi that they make it in. One bite and I was in love. I don’t remember how many times I ate the biryani on that trip but I had countless dreams of it when I was back, and every biryani I ate was compared to the biryani from Anantashram. Sadly, over the years their quality has gone down. On a recent trip I tried it and it was a let down. My brother and sister in law resonated my feelings, and had also told us beforehand that it might not be the same as the first time we had it.

Besides the biryani disappointment our Goa trip was a huge gastronomical success. As you can see in this post. We all came back with our clothes a little tighter. And I came back in search of a new Biryani as my yardstick.

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Dahi Ke kebabs (Hung Curd Kebabs) | The Novice Housewife

On a recent trip to Delhi, I was served these really delish Dahi ke kebabs (kebabs made from hung curd) and a reminder photograph on one of the food related facebook groups I am a part of gave me the nudge to try making these kebabs at home.

These kebabs are vegetarian kebabs and are made from mixing hung curd with onions, garlic, ginger and green chillies. Bread crumbs and roasted gram flour are used to bind the dough together. You could deep or shallow fry them and once eaten they melt in your mouth. It makes a great appetizer to serve at your dinner party.

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