I love my husband! He's such a sweetheart and the biggest nerd ever..He spent the whole of last weekend sitting with is computer designing my blog. Well! I'll admit that i said to him that I want a new beautiful face for my blog.. I mean why not? Of course I love cooking and writing and sharing my experiments with food but I too want it all to look beautiful. You know, what looks good chances are it will taste good too.
So now I had to give something in return too..right?? Before you imagine anything yourself let me tell you what I did..I tried this awesome recipe. I made Murgh Musallam. Something he had been waiting eat again since last my my parents were visiting us and my dad made this for a special occasion.
Murgh musallam is one of the most famous dishes of the Lahori cuisine. Lahore earlier a part of India and now of Pakistan gave birth to this type of cooking and it roots go deep into imperial kitchen of the the Mughal Empire. As it is acknowledged for its excellent meat dishes, the cuisine of Lahore has also become popular amongst masses of Muslims in India, due to the fact that meat dishes in the Indian cuisine are typically restricted to a low extent on the basis of religious beliefs (vegetarianism). Hence the name Musallam might have come.
So this dish which is made with fried spices stuffed into a whole chicken (murga) got its name murgh musallam. Now you know that this dish has a history as rich and old as the Mughal Empire itself.
As deep and complex as it might sound its one of the easiest recipes of chicken I know. Being a queen of quick- fix meals and trying to aww my hubby I had to try this one.
Ingredients:
1 whole chicken. We have a small family so I used a small Cornish hen weighing about a pound pound n a half instead of a big 3-4 pounder chicken. You can double the amount of the ingredients according to the size of the chicken.
1/2 cup chopped onion
3-4 cloves garlic
1 tsp ginger paste
1/2 cup tomato pureed
1bsp tomato ketchup
1 tbsp garam masala powder ( In case you are intrested in the real deal you can make curry powder at home too. Nothing it the whole world can beat fresh garam masala powder made with whole spices made at home. Will post the method in my blog soon!)
1 tbsp coriander powder
1 tsp cyanne pepper
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt to taste
Oil a thick bottom pan.
Grind onion, ginger & garlic into a thick paste and pour it into the pan.. Fry this mixture until you kill all the water in it and then add the dry ingredients into it. Stir it for about a minute and the add the tomatoe puree and ketchup into it. You need to stir this mixture only untill you feel that its half way fried. It should'nt turn golden brown but there should not be any water in it either. Now add the salt and turn the heat off.
Let the masala cool for a little while and then you stuff it in the cavity of the whole chicken. Remaining paste rub it all over the body of the chicken. Then put a few slits all over the body of the chicken and rub the paste inside too. If you let it stay like that to marinate for about half an hr that would be awesome but if you don't want to do that its ok.
Just heat the thick bottom pan, add a little oil and place the chicken on it. Cover the lid and turn the heat to the lowest. Let it cook on one side for about 10-15 mins and then flip it. Repeat the same untill the chicken is well cooked. To check if the chicken is cooked take a knife and cut the fleshy part, if its lightest pink to white in color that means the chicken is cooked.
You can serve this Murgh Musallam with any kind of Indian bread like naan or tandoori roti aur parathas or else it can be served with pulav or white steamed rice as well.
So now I had to give something in return too..right?? Before you imagine anything yourself let me tell you what I did..I tried this awesome recipe. I made Murgh Musallam. Something he had been waiting eat again since last my my parents were visiting us and my dad made this for a special occasion.
Murgh musallam is one of the most famous dishes of the Lahori cuisine. Lahore earlier a part of India and now of Pakistan gave birth to this type of cooking and it roots go deep into imperial kitchen of the the Mughal Empire. As it is acknowledged for its excellent meat dishes, the cuisine of Lahore has also become popular amongst masses of Muslims in India, due to the fact that meat dishes in the Indian cuisine are typically restricted to a low extent on the basis of religious beliefs (vegetarianism). Hence the name Musallam might have come.
So this dish which is made with fried spices stuffed into a whole chicken (murga) got its name murgh musallam. Now you know that this dish has a history as rich and old as the Mughal Empire itself.
As deep and complex as it might sound its one of the easiest recipes of chicken I know. Being a queen of quick- fix meals and trying to aww my hubby I had to try this one.
Ingredients:
1 whole chicken. We have a small family so I used a small Cornish hen weighing about a pound pound n a half instead of a big 3-4 pounder chicken. You can double the amount of the ingredients according to the size of the chicken.
1/2 cup chopped onion
3-4 cloves garlic
1 tsp ginger paste
1/2 cup tomato pureed
1bsp tomato ketchup
1 tbsp garam masala powder ( In case you are intrested in the real deal you can make curry powder at home too. Nothing it the whole world can beat fresh garam masala powder made with whole spices made at home. Will post the method in my blog soon!)
1 tbsp coriander powder
1 tsp cyanne pepper
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt to taste
Oil a thick bottom pan.
Grind onion, ginger & garlic into a thick paste and pour it into the pan.. Fry this mixture until you kill all the water in it and then add the dry ingredients into it. Stir it for about a minute and the add the tomatoe puree and ketchup into it. You need to stir this mixture only untill you feel that its half way fried. It should'nt turn golden brown but there should not be any water in it either. Now add the salt and turn the heat off.
Let the masala cool for a little while and then you stuff it in the cavity of the whole chicken. Remaining paste rub it all over the body of the chicken. Then put a few slits all over the body of the chicken and rub the paste inside too. If you let it stay like that to marinate for about half an hr that would be awesome but if you don't want to do that its ok.
Just heat the thick bottom pan, add a little oil and place the chicken on it. Cover the lid and turn the heat to the lowest. Let it cook on one side for about 10-15 mins and then flip it. Repeat the same untill the chicken is well cooked. To check if the chicken is cooked take a knife and cut the fleshy part, if its lightest pink to white in color that means the chicken is cooked.
You can serve this Murgh Musallam with any kind of Indian bread like naan or tandoori roti aur parathas or else it can be served with pulav or white steamed rice as well.
