Tandoori chicken is a whole chicken, marinated in yogurt and spices and cooked on a skewer in a hot tandoor or clay oven. It gets its name tandoori from being cooked in the tandoor. Sabina Kapoor has simplified this recipe and shows us how to make tandoori chicken in our home ovens.

Sabina Kapoor is a beautiful human being, through and through. Beauty is synonymous with her. Her home, her family, her entertaining, her work at her Beauty Spa and now her new venture, Fleur de Lee an interior consultancy, all carry her sense of beauty and style. Taking up a challenge and excelling in it, is her motto.

Mother of two charming daughters and now grandmother to two energetic grandchildren, her home is always welcoming visitors from near and far. From managing beautifully decorated homes, to taking care of her children and now her grandchildren, she has done so with elan.

After settling her daughters in their married lives, and successfully running a beauty spa in her family hotel, she has now ventured into interior decoration of high-end homes and retail showrooms. She is a one stop shop for interior styling, procurement of brass fittings, wall light scones, table lamps, chandeliers, wrought iron staircases, all which carry her classic taste and style.

Married at the young age of 19 years, into a food loving Punjabi family, she had to learn to cook and entertain the many relatives and friends that were over on a regular basis.

A staple on her menu is Tandoori Chicken, a favourite of the Punjabis. Her recipe is a simple, fuss free and delicious version of the tandoori chicken made famous by the ‘Moti Mahal’ restaurant in Delhi. For the modern household, using a tandoor or clay oven with hot coals indoors and in apartments is not possible.

Sabina Kapoor uses her kitchen counter top oven to get the same taste and texture as chicken cooked in a tandoor. This makes her recipe of tandoori chicken a must have for all of us.

Sabina’s secret is that she buys a raw chicken and deep freezes it for about 24 hours before defrosting it to start the marination process. According to her, this helps in softening the chicken and makes the flesh less stringy.

For getting the right flavour she uses two marinades. It is important to marinate the chicken for as long as she has suggested. For convenience sake, she marinates portions of the chicken in food grade Ziploc bags and keeps them in the freezer. This makes it easy to have a party dish ready when unexpected visitors arrive.

Tandoori Chicken

Indian Barbeque Chicken

First Marinade

Ingredients ~

700 gms broiler chicken, cut into 6 pieces
3 inch piece ginger
6 garlic pods
1 tsp salt

Method ~

1. Weigh the chicken and cut into appropriate pieces.
2. With a knife, make deep gashes on both sides of the chicken pieces.
3. Make a paste of ginger and garlic, add the salt and rub this thoroughly into the chicken pieces.
4. Leave in the fridge, covered, for a minimum of 2 hours.

Second Marinade

Ingredients ~

½ inch piece nutmeg/jaifal,  ground
3-4 flakes mace/javetri, ground
1 tsp roasted cumin, ground
¼ tsp salt
6 tbsp hung yogurt
2 1/2 tbsp mustard oil
A pinch of food grade orange colour powder, optional

Method ~

1. Heat the mustard oil to smoking point, cool.
2. Beat the hung yogurt.
3. Add the powdered masalas, nutmeg, mace, roasted cumin and salt to the yogurt.
4. Mix in the mustard oil and the powdered colour if using.
5. Apply the second marinate to the chicken pieces and refrigerate for minimum of 24 hours for best results.

Cooking Method ~

1. Heat the oven to 250*C, use the setting to heat both the upper and lower electric rods.
2. Place the chicken pieces on the oven wire rack. This will ensure the chicken pieces are heated from the top and the bottom.
3. Cook the chicken for 20 minutes.
4. Take out the wire rack from the oven and brush the chicken on both sides with cream.
5. Place the wire rack back in the oven and cook for another 10 minutes or until cooked through.
6. Once cooked through, take the wire rack out and sprinkle some roasted cumin powder/jeera and dry mango powder/amchoor on the chicken.
7. Squeeze some lemon juice over the chicken pieces.

~ Serve with green coriander and mint chutney and naan.