Recipe Three - Chicken Tikka Masala

Tonight was night three in Jamie Oliver Week at Casa de Fehling. I made the Chicken Tikka Masala recipe on page 82.

Alterations made to the recipe:

*I didn't use the chile because I don't like spicy food.

*I used four fresh tomatoes instead of the 14oz can of tomatoes, because y'all know how I feel about canned tomatoes. I just peeled them with a paring knife, dumped the seeds into a bowl, and diced the flesh. Then I strained the seeds to get all the juice from them. That's what is in the glass measuring cup in the above photo.

*I used Greek yogurt because I got a coupon in the mail for a free one.

*I left out the almonds. Not a big fan of nuts in savory foods.

Also worth noting - the recipe gives you the option of using either a tikka masala paste, a mild curry paste, or making your own tikka masala paste using the recipe in the book. I went with the Patak's mild curry paste because all the recipes in this section have that as an option so it seemed like the best buy for my money.

The verdict?

Another winner, folks. The sauce was very thin at the end of the cooking time, so I let it simmer uncovered for an additional ten minutes. That seemed to solve the problem. I served it with plain, steamed, short grain white rice, because I am too lazy to go to all the work to make basmati rice according to the directions in the cookbook.

My child, who normally spits out chicken (but loves shrimp and beef, go figure) ate up every bite of his dinner and not one piece of chicken was spit out. Both my husband and I were extremely impressed. The little hint of tang provided by mixing in the yogurt and lemon juice at the end was really a nice detail in the flavor of this dish.

I think I'm going to need to buy this cookbook.